Introduction
After months of development, BULB’s Article NFTs & SFTs are finally here!
We want to share two key aspects that shaped our approach to Article NFTs, firstly, the vision for BULB’s Article NFTs and secondly, how Article NFTs & SFTs work exactly.
This is all you need to know…
Approach to Article NFTs
When we set out to develop this feature for our BULBers, we were clear on day 1 that there were three key objectives for Article NFTs.
- Simplify the proof of provenance for writers
- Creating a genuine economic use case for NFTs
- Drive community engagement between writers and readers
For proof of provenance, the minter of the Article NFT is theoretically the copyright owner of the underlying creative content. That said, we all know that this alone is not enough, as anyone can “copy” an article, and mint it as their own. To resolve this, we leveraged our existing governance infrastructure, where any article can be “taken down” if it infringes copyright. As such, if the Article NFT is just a forgery, it will still be minted on the blockchain, but it won’t be discoverable on the platform. Therefore, by combining BULB’s community driven governance system and NFT minting feature, BULB can be the go-to place for content creators on the internet to get their proof of provenance by minting a BULB Article NFT.
The synergy between BULB’s Article NFTs and the governance system is second to none.
For creating a genuine economic use case, it was clear to us that many NFTs/SFTs struggle to create true utility. At the end of the day, it’s just a “stamp” on the blockchain. There’s nothing wrong with that, just that it can be better. So, we looked at what is most valuable on the BULB platform and how that can be incorporated.
Tracing back, while many would think BULB Tokens are the most valuable commodity on BULB, we would say that BULB Points are actually most valuable, because more points leads to more tokens, and points can only be created through engagement and can never be bought.
So, we thought of a wild idea: tokenising the points generated by the articles, such that the NFT holder can earn points from holding an Article NFT. Effectively, the fundamental value of BULB’s Article NFT is the future value of all the BULB Points that can be generated from the article, by extension, the BULB Tokens that can be earned.
BULB’s Article NFT tokenisation mechanism is one of a kind.
For driving community engagement between writers and readers, we initially were going to stick with just enabling Article NFTs, that is, a one-to-one relationship between the creator and the audience. However, we thought that this is not necessarily scalable, as blogging is different to other art forms, such as generative art, the writer would have to create 1,000 articles to distribute 1,000 NFTs to his/her readers. We came to the natural conclusion that the option of creating semi-fungible tokens (SFTs) effectively enables one-to-many relationships between the creator and their audience. Now, writers can theoretically create 1 article and distribute 1,000 SFTs to his/her readers, whereby the SFT holder signifies the support for the writer.
This engagement model is disruptive for writers and readers.
On a standalone basis, each of the three aspects would hardly be innovative. However, the combination of these three aspects forms the foundation of our approach to Article NFTs/SFTs.
How Article NFTs & SFTs Work
Here’s how everything works in a nutshell…
Firstly, BULB Article NFTs are created when a published blog is minted on the Solana blockchain, in which the Article NFT holder will be the sole beneficiary of all the BULB points derived from the particular published blog. Therefore, as an Article NFT holder, you can benefit from the engagement and traffic generated from the blog, thereby boosting your own leaderboard position and BULB Token rewards. Fundamentally, the “stamp” on the blockchain combined with the “tokenisation” of points derived are the two core use cases of Article NFTs.
Secondly, to create a BULB Article NFT, you can select any one of your own published blogs from the profile or marketplace, click the ‘mint’ button, determine if you want to issue an NFT (1 article, 1 owner) or SFT (1 article, N number of owners), choose if you wish to tokenise BULB Points or mint as a plain NFT or SFT, and finally create the Article NFT or SFT. You can select royalty fees of anywhere between 1 to 10% and each Article NFT costs 0.1 SOL to mint.
Thirdly, the Article NFT or SFT will appear in your crypto wallet upon successful minting on the Solana blockchain. The latest Article NFT or SFT holder will be the sole beneficiary or pro rata beneficiary of all the BULB points derived from the particular published blog. The initial owner of the Article NFT or SFT will be the publisher of the blog, but this can be traded to another Article NFT or SFT holder, who from the point of transfer will now gain all the points from the published blog. The published blog card that is minted as an Article NFT or SFT will have special visual effects when discovered and explored on all BULB platform pages.
Finally, to buy or sell your own Article NFTs or SFTs, you can go to the marketplace tab, select your available Article NFTs or SFTs and list it or buy it for SOL. As the collection owner, you can set the floor price of your Article NFTs or SFTs to ensure your Article NFTs or SFTs trade at above your desired price, and this can be changed anytime.
All users have their own dedicated Article NFTs or SFTs collections page, regardless of whether the user has minted Article NFTs / SFTs or not. Everyone is a creator on BULB.
To learn more about Article NFTs & SFTs, visit our FAQ page to get all the details.
Looking Ahead
That’s everything you need to know about BULB’s Article NFTs!
BULB’s Article NFTs/SFTs is a powerful tool for writers to completely level up the engagement with their community. Combined with BULB’s community engagement tool where writers can airdrop Article NFTs/SFTs to top contributors, the relationship between writers and readers can now be stronger than ever.
With BULB Article NFTs/SFTs finally going live, the BULB development team will explore more innovative ways for creators to leverage blockchain technology and further enhance community engagement between the writer and reader. Article NFTs/SFTs as it stands right now is predominantly the proof of provenance and the tokenization of economic benefits on BULB, but it can be so much more.
We can create NFT/SFT based memberships for each tribe. We can create combinations and merging of existing NFTs/SFTs to create brand new content. We can create NFTs/SFTs that can be levelled up based on the activity and rarity. The possibilities are endless.
This is a whole new world, and we are just at the beginning of true Web3 Social Media.
- BULB Team
