- Devin Finzer, co-founder and CEO of OpenSea, states that personal expression is the key to the future of cryptography.
- He also shared some of the risks of less regulated spaces, including hackers and scammers.
- Finzer predicts that NFTs will evolve to make billions of people more customized and accessible.
The CEO of the largest NFT marketplace believes that cryptocurrencies are a “cultural movement.”
“You talk to people today and they devote their lives to cryptocurrencies,” Devin Finzer told host Patrick O’Shaughnessy. October 7th episode Of the “Founder’s Field Guide” podcast. “All of their friends are cryptocurrencies, and their community is growing slowly but steadily.”
You don’t have to look anymore High seasA market co-founded by Finzer in 2017 to realize the truth of his remarks.
In August, the platform’s transaction volume reached $ 3.4 billion, but only 12 months ago it was about $ 1 million. Currently, there are about 22 million items sold on the platform.
Because OpenSea has established itself as one of the fastest and longest-lived players in the field. Soaring interest in NFTs Earlier this year. NFT, or Non-substitutable tokenUnique and irreplaceable, Mainly valuable digital items Users buy and sell online.
NFTs, like cryptocurrencies, use blockchain technology to maintain a digital record of ownership.They were first launched on Ethereum, the same blockchain that supports cryptocurrencies. etherAnd to date, most NFTs are still only available for purchase using ether.
Given the Periodic nature In the crypto and blockchain business, Finzer says it’s not uncommon to observe a surge in prices and excitement followed by sudden cuts.
“As a business, you have to prepare it from a cash flow, cultural point of view within the company,” he said.
NFT art is evolving
One of the NFT categories that Finzer says has been getting a lot of attention lately is generative art. This art form is created by algorithms rather than humans, allowing an artist to create a large number of unique and unique works.
Fidenza # 313from Fidenza Collection One of the generative artworks was resold at OpenSea on August 23 for 1,000 ethers, or $ 3.3 million at the time. Creator Tyler Hobbs, who turned from a software engineer to a full-time artist, has already won the net. Over $ 4 Million Fees From an estimated $ 85 million for secondary sales.
Finzer also points to the emergence of profile photo-style NFTs as a clear identity for cryptocurrency movements.
“These specific types of entities— Boring ape yacht club, CryptoPunk People around the world — providing people with a way to actually participate in the cultural movement and show off and appreciate each other in this environment. ” Twitter and
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By owning an NFT, users Membership benefitsAs well as provide an identifiable digital ID.
Finzer’s thoughts on the future of NFTs
In fact, Finzer emphasizes this growing feeling of individual specificity as one of the key characteristics of the future NFT market.
“I think you’ll see a more customized and tuned experience,” he said. “And again, I hope this is less than five years, but it just gives regular users full access to it. Someone can own an NFT from scratch in minutes. I think this is very important. “
Today, NFTs primarily represent digital collections, but Finzer believes that it may change in the future, and one day imagines a space dedicated to OpenSea’s physical items. He believes that real estate and event tickets in particular may benefit from NFT tokenization.
Finzer also suggests future changes in Ethereum’s dominance in purchasing NFTs, but admits that it is difficult to recreate Ethereum’s rich ecosystem.
“It’s worth thinking about starting anew, supporting different programming languages, and rethinking some basics,” he said. “OpenSea was built to allow us to add meaningful blockchains to support. We’ll soon see some interesting stuff.”
Dark side of NFT
Finzer said that one of the basic elements of OpenSea, accessible to everyone, is also a major risk source.
OpenSea allows any user to generate and sell NFTs, but the openness of the platform can cause problems. One of the real examples Finzer pointed out is a scammer who takes screenshots of existing Cryptopunks and resells them as originals.
While OpenSea has the infrastructure to deal with scammers, it continues to develop more sophisticated ways to circumvent the system Finzer calls the “cat and mouse game.” He acknowledges that scammers are another challenge that they are forced to accept as OpenSea serves as a major market and seeks to enhance its permanence.
Due to the novelty of the NFT ecosystem, it is largely unregulated, opening up other opportunities for phishers and hackers.
“People are using it because it’s such a new space and we don’t understand how everything works,” Finzer said.
There is also a new problem with Insider trading.. The scandal exploded in September, when one of OpenSea’s employees bought an NFT and then resigned before it was listed on the top page of the market, resulting in a plunge in sales.
Finzer acknowledges the dark side of the field, but we are confident that NFTs will grow from their current state of being a somewhat niche market to use cases for billions of people.
“I think it’s becoming more and more mainstream and has an even bigger impact on the world,” he said.
“I think the extraordinary change in terms of market size is [the next five years].. “
