The Next “Binance-Scale” Business in Crypto? Infrastructure Around Non-Fungible Token Dapps

I’ve blogged a couple times on how I believe scarcity is fundamentally going to be the biggest driver for crypto-native applications. By crypto-native apps, I mean applications that are born into the crypto world, not centralized applications that are ported into crypto protocols.

Digging deeper into this thesis, I believe there will be three indispensable infrastructure businesses around NFT dapps:

1. Easy to Create Non-Fungible Tokens. NFTs are going to be needed for games and collectible type dapps, as well as other unforeseen and creative use cases. We need a TPS-scalable, and easy-to-use service provider to create NFTs.
2. Decentralized Exchange (DEX) for NFTs. Since NFTs can be traded and sold, it’s necessary to have a IDEX-like exchange that can support the trading of NFTs, with ETH, BTC or stable coin trading pairs.
3. Wallet for Non-Fungible Tokens. Once a user owns a NFT, we need a seamless user-experience to own and move those NFT assets in a mobile wallet similar to ImToken, Trust or Coinbase’s mobile apps.

I expect there could be a “Binance-Scale” business for companies that solve for any of the three NFT dapp infrastructure pieces mentioned above. Maybe not in terms of Binance’s $10B+ valuation and revenue numbers, but in terms of reach and audience, I definitely believe the next mainstream and consumer-level craze can be around NFT dapps. An easy-to-use NFT wallet, for example, could be indispensable product for users to access a variety of dapps, similar to how Blockfolio and Delta were indispensable for tracking speculative crypto portfolios in 2017 and 2018.

A “non-fungible token” or “non-fungible digital asset” is unique digital content that can be owned, traded and sold. Its authenticity is verified via blockchain. It truly is a breakthrough feature that is unique to crypto and blockchain. NFTs can enable new use cases for consumer applications; never before were we able to have digital scarcity on the web.

Other influential crypto investors are bullish on blockchain enabling a better exchange of value. Brock Pierce says blockchain is enabling an Internet of Value. Adam Draper says the internet has always been “abundant” prior to crypto and he’s investing in projects related to non-fungibles.

Scarcity and collectibles are the only qualities in blockchain applications that simply wasn’t possible before. A few folks have asked me I’m so excited for projects like Ecomi and ERC721 projects; it’s because I would rather take a chance and bet on what hasn’t been possible before, then to try and build or port what has been done before in the centralized infrastructure world. For example, I would be more optimistic on the possibilities of a crypto game over a decentralized Facebook. 2017 was the year of alt coin speculation, I think we might be ready for NFT adoption in 2019 and 2020.

Some of collectible NFT dapps ideas I have include:

1. Digital pets
2. Fighting games
3. Collectibles using AR/VR
4. Digital art
5. Collectible card games like Hearthstone
6. MMO games
7. Any more ideas? Feel free to comment or tweet at me at twitter.com/alee

Although ERC-721 is the leader now for non-fungibles, there could be other competing protocols that will challenge its lead.