Newsletter #90 - The Thing with NFTs

Welcome to the Metaverse, are you ready?

Earlier this year, non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, became a thing. NFTs are digital assets that can be bought or sold online. With NFTs, artists and creators have found a lucrative way of earning money, while more brands are minting digital collectibles that their consumers can buy and own.

Now, NFT sales surge to $10.7bn in Q3, hitting new highs as plenty of tech companies, such as TikTok, are dipping their toes into NFTS and Coinbase, the world’s 2nd largest crypto exchange, is bringing NFT to the masses.

Always be learning,

Team NC

🚀 NFT gains momentum for brands and artists in Asia

#TRENDS

Southeast Asia’s burgeoning cryptoart movement [The Ken]

A leap for art, a lifeline for artists - Digital artists are used to being taken less seriously and physical art was almost always where the money was, but NFT has upended digital art. In the NFT world, artists can now set prices and open bids for their own works online, using platforms like SuperRare, Nifty Gateway, or OpenSea.

A new dawn for SEAsia’s artists - Artists in Asia said that NFTs have been game-changers. Before, most artists depended on work-for-hire jobs which often meant sticking to clients’ specifications and didn't allow them to retain the commercial rights for their work.

Now, not only do artists enjoy creative freedom when they sell their work as NFTs, they earn more as well, saying they’ve made 4-5 times more than what they would normally get from commissioned work.

#BUSINESS

Can NFTs happen in a crypto-less China? [Protocol]

Apparently, yes. But how? - In the West, NFTs are almost inseparable from crypto where the majority of NFT artworks like Bored Apes are minted on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain. So, if people want to buy NFT’s, they need an ETH wallet. However, without legal access to ETH in China, companies like Alibaba and Tencent have created their own home-brewed blockchain technologies to trade NFTs.

In the past 2 months, Tencent has built an app to trade NFTs, Alibaba sold 50 NFT mooncakes to promote the trend, and a handful of startups are competing to be the winner of China’s local NFT trading market.

Avoiding financial risks - Still, no matter the crypto workarounds, NFT trading in China doesn’t feel the same way. Artworks are priced in RMB and transactions are paid with non-crypto methods like Alipay or Wechat Pay.

The reason for this discrepancy is that China wants to avoid financial risks. Cryptocurrencies are notorious for their volatile values, which makes speculation rampant; they also provide new ways for money to be laundered and for capital to leave China.

#TECH

OpenSea fixes vulnerabilities that let hackers steal crypto with ‘gifted’ NFTs [The Verge]

Getting hacked - Researchers from Check Point Research have uncovered how critical vulnerabilities in OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, allowed crypto hackers to steal users’ entire crypto wallets.

Modus operandi - The attack relied on user inattention and the fact that the OpenSea app generates a lot of pop-ups. If a victim receives and views a malicious NFT sent by a hacker, it triggers a pop-up from OpenSea, requesting a connection to the victim's crypto wallet. Clicking on the popup would then give the hacker access to steal all their money.

Issues fixed - OpenSea says it’s working with third-party wallet providers to help people recognize malicious signature requests and are giving users the option to suspend their accounts if they think it’s been compromised.

🖱️ Right click save as

Other Newsletters

Newsletter #106 - How no-code changes the tech space

No items found.
How no-code platforms are changing the tech space

Newsletter #105 - Break the bias with International Women’s Day 2022

No items found.
Happy Women's History Month! #breakthebias What's next for global tech?; future of Femtech; Asia's gender pay gap

Newsletter #104 - What Russia-Ukraine Conflict means for Asian businesses

No items found.
How Russia-Ukraine conflict is affecting Asian businesses

Newsletter #103 - HRtech and building teams

No items found.
Insane amounts of venture dollars are flooding HR tech

Newsletter #102 - Bank scam pandemic

No items found.
Inside Asia's bank scam pandemic

Newsletter #101 - Future of the creator economy

No items found.
Artists earn millions selling digital stickers on LINE app

Newsletter #100 - Mental health industry in Asia

No items found.
Wellness in Asia, how to win the $1.5 trillion market

Newsletter #99 - Web3: Fad or future?

No items found.
Is Web3 the future or just a fad?

Newsletter #98 - Delivery in Asia

No items found.
How Meituan is redefining food delivery in China with drones

Newsletter #97 - Reducing Food Waste in Asia

No items found.
Why Asia's having a food crisis: Over 7 tonnes of chicken discarded daily

Newsletter #96 - The Great Resignation in Asia

No items found.
Great Resignation crunches tech sector, but boosts freelance industry

Newsletter #95 - The world's in an Omnicron limbo

No items found.
How bad will Omicron be? Will vaccines still work?

Newsletter #94 - AI-generated content

No items found.
AI-generated content is here to stay

Newsletter #93 - Agritech

No items found.
Jack Ma sets eyes on farming after Europe tours

Newsletter #91 - Businesses must take lead on climate action

No items found.
👊 Our last best chance vs. the climate crisis

Newsletter #90 - The Thing with NFTs

No items found.
Welcome to the Metaverse, are you ready?

Newsletter #89 - Buy now, pay later industry in Asia

No items found.
How 'buy now, pay later' is driving Asia's super apps like Grab, Gojek

Newsletter #88 - The Streaming Wars

No items found.
How Netflix got beat by Hong Kong’s Viu streaming service

Newsletter #87 - Evergrande crisis and the real estate industry

No items found.
Evergrande and APAC's housing boom

Newsletter #86 - Video games industry's diversity problem

No items found.
Video game industry’s discriminatory problem

Newsletter #85 - Fashion and resale industry in Asia

No items found.
Why is secondhand fashion becoming popular?

Newsletter #84 - Healthtech startup plugging healthcare gaps

No items found.
How Asia's healthtech startups are filling up healthcare gaps

Newsletter #83 - China’s toxic 996 work culture

No items found.
Is this the end for China’s 996 work culture?

Newsletter #82 - Vaccine passports

No items found.
Is Asia ready to implement vaccine passports?

Newsletter #81 - Asia’s super apps

No items found.
Super apps' next stop: Hyper-verticals

Newsletter #80 - Sharing economy

No items found.
Why Asia’s creator economy is rising

Newsletter #78 - Global chip shortage

No items found.
Why South Korea is investing $450bn in microchips

Newsletter #77 - Billionaire space race

No items found.
What the billionaire space race means for rest of us

Newsletter #76 - Post-pandemic stress

No items found.
How to manage your employees’ stress and anxiety

Newsletter #75 - Meme stocks

No items found.
Insights: What are meme stocks? How communities mobilise capital & markets quickly

Newsletter #74 - AI and big data

No items found.
How AI and big data are fuelling APAC’s retail industry

Newsletter #73 - Future of Asia’s digital banks

No items found.
Why a fifth of SE Asia's bank branches could close by 2030

Newsletter #72 - SEA startups

No items found.
Why SEA startups are primed to succeed

Newsletter #71 - Electric cars

No items found.
China tech titans bet $19bn on electric car frenzy

Newsletter #70 - Diversity and inclusion

No items found.
Only 58% of SEA companies have DEI programmes. Why?

Newsletter #107 - How SEA is gearing up for the EV revolution

No items found.
Evergrande gets go-ahead to sell electric vehicles, Tesla's self-driving beta disaster; how to find purpose

Newsletter #108 - Future of language AI

No items found.
What if we could also build machines that can understand and use language just like we do?
View All Newsletters >