Not many have forgotten the beginning of NFTs, when million-dollar monkey JPEGs ruled the spotlight. They were like those high-end parties where lights keep flashing, champagne flutes are always full, and price tags have more zeros than someone’s annual salary.
NFTs moved swiftly from being an experiment to becoming a global phenomenon, capturing headlines, minting billions and creating never-seen-before digital communities. It was a frenzy full of celebrity-backed collections and overnight success stories. Then came the change, and NFTs faced a massive backlash and a decline of speculative hype. Soon critics jumped to the conclusion, calling out ‘NFTs are dead’.
The truth, however, is far from this statement. NFTs are emerging as more meaningful, and sustainable assets. In reality, NFTs were never about just some cartoon GIFs or digital art auctions. They were in fact the digital keys that proved your ownership over something unique on the blockchain. And now, these keys, instead of rusting away, are unlocking new doors of finance, gaming, and events. This way the next phase of NFTs looks more defined by utility and innovation. 
From collectibles to real-world utilities
Initially, NFTs was all about novelties where digital art and collectibles ruled the core essence of the sector. It felt like royalty to own a digital collectible on blockchain. Projects like CryptoPunks, Bored Ape Yacht Club became status symbols and a part of soaring culture. So much so, that NFTs blurred the lines between finance, art and internet clout through its focus on soaring prices and celebrity-backed launches.
Eventually, the hype faded, the prices dropped, and the media headlines shifted to other more interesting chart movers. But the developers never stopped working to bring the real value of NFTs to the surface. The result is no less than a groundbreaking revolution, NFTs are formally shifting towards utility-based use cases.
Access to the events: NFTs are most commonly used as digital tickets for concerts, sports and conferences. It has emerged as a cool way to offer verifiable ownership while eliminating fraud.
Assets for the games: Another cool way to use NFTs is to use them as in-game items, skins, and characters. This way gamers could truly own and use their in-game assets, using them across platforms.
Tokenizing real-world assets: NFTs are also being actively applied to real estate deeds, car titles, and intellectual properties. This comes in handy for creating a more efficient and transparent system for ownership transfer.
NFTs and AI
Artificial Intelligence is layering onto NFT evolution giving it a dynamic and interactive makeover. AI-generated art, music, and other collectibles are naturally welcomed in the NFT ecosystem. AI helps it to adapt, learn, and evolve over time and not just sit idle in your wallet. Imagine your profile picture changing as per your online activities, or a music NFT making a remix as per your likings or maybe a storybook NFT where AI personalizes the narrative as you read. The choices are endless and far more engaging than before.
NFT and DeFi
Now things are getting more interesting. NFTs are planning to get into decentralized finance – NFT-Fi. This intersection of NFT and financial products is all set to give tokens new liquidity and opportunities.
NFT lending: This will let holders borrow liquidity against their NFT holdings without selling them.
Fractional ownership: A high-value NFT can be divided into tradable shares of smaller sizes allowing a user to get hold of it in a smaller fraction.
NFT Index Funds: This is like a basket of multiple NFTs curated for the investors where they can buy the entire collection with a single token.
This financial layer transforms NFTs into an asset from a collectible with real financial weight.
NFT and the metaverse
The concept of the metaverse is still developing and there is no second thought that the NFTs will play a pivotal role in shaping its foundation. The idea of NFT integration is simple: if there is a digital metaverse where you will live, work and play, then you must have its ownership. One cannot simply lose all the accumulated assets as soon as they log off or change their platform. So, from branded wearables to tokenized assets, NFTs are everywhere providing necessary infrastructure.
As platforms like Meta, Roblox, and other decentralized metaverses grow, it will be on NFTs to stick them together providing a unique user experience.
The conclusion
In a nutshell, NFTs are not dead, they are hibernating and while doing so they are entering their most matured phase to date. They might have started as a flashy trend, but now they have matured and are coming up with real-world use cases, digital ownership and community building. They will not disappear because innovation rarely does! They will evolve and will become indispensable to the future of Web3
