The NFT craze has hit Indonesia like a tidal wave since it surfaced from the digital sphere following the game-changing blockchain technology. Non-fungible tokens or NFTs, also known as nifties are part of the Ethereum blockchain, a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin. Non-fungible means that it’s unique and can’t be duplicated or traded for anything else. For example, a Bitcoin is fungible, if you trade one for another, you’ll get exactly a Bitcoin. One of a kind trading cards are non-fungible - if you trade one for a different card, you'll have an entirely different item. To put in terms of collecting physical art: anyone can purchase a Mona Lisa print, but only one person can own the original.
NFTs are a digital representation of drawings, music, GIFs and anything that can be uploaded in the digital realm. They are bought and sold online and encoded with the underlying softwares as cryptos. These cryptographic tokens are recorded on a blockchain and can be used to prove authenticity, ownership and provenance of anything, be it physical or non-physical such as artwork, collectable cards, or real estate.
A lot of the current excitement now is quadrant around using the tech to sell digital art. NFT has totally flipped the game for artists, allowing creators the authority to rent, sell or display them however they wish. To sell them, creators need to “legalised” ownership of their work by tokenising on Blockchain service that records information in a way that makes it very difficult to hack or scam, making it useful for tracking copyright ownership and maintaining records of creation. Theoretically, any digital work you create and mint will lead solely to you and has its own value.
Like most trends, Indonesian creators have joined the fray with no sight of slowing down, especially after news of an Indonesian computer science student from Semarang became an overnight millionaire selling his selfies as NFTs on OpenSea marketplace. With many creators tagging in the craze, we’ve compiled some of Indonesian NFT artists to note.