The e-commerce giant is allowing users to acquire NFTs for digital collectibles like images, trading cards, or videos on its platform.
eBay is officially the first e-commerce firm to implement NFTs in its network. According to a blog post published on Tuesday, this isn’t something completely new to the company. eBay has always been interested in collectibles, helping collectors turn their passion into something profitable. As technology advances, this space is changing as well.
“NFTs offer greater access to a broader audience of collectors and creators. In the same way, digital publishing brought more exposure for writers digital collectibles bring greater opportunity for artists and creators. We plan to double down on this idea – combining eBay’s global reach with the principle that anyone can find almost anything on our platform. This premise is what makes NFTs on eBay so exciting and why we want to partner with creators, sellers, and brands who share our commitment to maintaining an open marketplace.”
eBay’s blog post
Non-fungible tokens have captured everyone’s attention lately, even of seemingly unrelated industries.
But what are exactly NFTs, and how do they work?
NFTs, short for non-fungible tokens, are new types of crypto assets that indicate a variety of palpable or non-physical goods. The ownership of these tokens is recorded on a blockchain, similar to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. But unlike them, which are interchangeable, NFTs aren’t exchangeable.
Most NFTs were created utilizing ERC-721 and ERC-1155 Ethereum token standards. Even though Ethereum is a fungible digital currency like Bitcoin, its blockchain sustains NFTs as well. Since NFTs aren’t exchangeable, you won’t be able to trade one NFT for another as you do with fiat currencies or other assets because there are no two identical tokens. Since they are unique and also kept on the blockchain, NFTs are authentic.
That’s very beneficial for digital assets because they can be copied innumerable times and are difficult to own. NFTs can be the solution to these problems, proving that one digital file is the only “original.”
