Why Should You Care About a $69.3m Digital Artwork?

On March 11, 2021, digital artist Beeple became one of the top three most valuable living artists when his digital art collection was auctioned for a whopping $69.3 million. A friend of mine, Peter Kell, bought the “Homer PEPE” digital card for $39k two years ago, and sold it on February 28th for 205 ETH (equivalent to ~half a million dollars)

Beeple got his money while his buyer received an NFT (non-fungible token) of the artwork. This is to show you the value of Digital art. More proof that NFT’s are the real deal and will be a big part of how art & unique services are sold in the future.

But what’s an NFT?

NFT stands for non-fungible token. It’s a unique digital token representing an item. When something is fungible, it means it can be exchanged with another thing of the same kind, which has equal value.

A $10 note is fungible. You can exchange it for another $10 note and still have $10. But if you create an NFT for say, the first-ever stethoscope created, you’ve made a unique token that represents the original material.

There’s no other object that is exactly equal to the token or can be swapped directly for it. If someone does you a unique favor, you’re more inclined to give that person a nice unique gift for their birthday. That gift is non-fungible. It’s unique. Yes, anyone can buy a Monet print as a gift. But only one person can own the original.