What does the future hold?

It is difficult to know exactly where NFTs will take us. The technology has already changed considerably, and some of the things that seemed important a few years ago have disappeared while other ideas have quietly continued to grow.

Perhaps that is part of what makes it interesting.

NFTs don't have to remain what they were in 2021. In fact, I think their future is likely to be much broader than the first wave of NFT art and collecting.

We are already becoming more comfortable with owning things digitally. We buy music, books, games, clothing for digital characters and experiences that exist entirely online. As more of our lives move between the physical and digital worlds, the ability to establish ownership, identity and provenance online becomes increasingly useful.

This is where NFTs could become much more practical.

An artist might use an NFT to establish the history of a work. A musician could connect a digital release with access to an experience. A game could allow players to genuinely own certain digital objects. Tickets could become digital assets that are easier to verify and transfer. Memberships and communities could use them to provide access without relying on a traditional membership card.

There is also something particularly exciting happening at the intersection of NFTs, artificial intelligence and digital art.

Artists now have more tools than ever before. AI can become part of the creative process, while blockchain technology can provide a way of recording the history and ownership of the resulting work. These technologies are still developing, and we are only beginning to see what artists will do when they have access to both.

I don't think the future will necessarily be about everyone owning thousands of NFTs.

It may be much quieter than that.

NFTs could become something we use without thinking about them very much at all. The technology may sit underneath a digital artwork, a ticket, a membership or an online experience without needing to be the main attraction.

And I think that is a positive thing.

The most interesting technologies often become ordinary once people find useful things to do with them.

For artists, there is still a great deal of room to experiment. Digital artists are no longer limited to simply putting an image online and hoping people find it. They can build communities around their work, create ongoing relationships with collectors, experiment with generative and AI-assisted practices and explore entirely new forms of digital ownership.

We are still very early in this story.

There will undoubtedly be things that don't work. There will be projects that disappear, ideas that turn out to be less useful than expected and technologies that are replaced by something better.

That is normal.

What matters is that the opportunity to experiment is still here.

For anyone who has been curious about digital art, NFTs or Web3 but felt that they missed the moment, I don't think you have missed it.

There isn't one moment to miss.

The technology is changing, the artists are changing and the possibilities are changing with them.

The next chapter may look very different from the first.

And perhaps that is the most exciting part of all.

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