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Mercy Masha

I believe people who get into NFTs have a child inside of them. It takes an inner child to look at a cartoon ape or a pixelated punk and think, “Yeah I’d pay $100k for that.” And when you meet these people in person, if you wouldn’t know what they are talking about you would think that they’re a little bit “coocoo” because you will see two adults seriously discuss the difference between the glasses or the fur coat which that cartoon ape is wearing. This playfulness of the space is what really drew me in when I stumbled upon it. Before that I was a lawyer back home, when I came to Dubai, I landed a job in business development in the tech industry because I had some experience in reading coding and from my law background and I was good at analyzing documents. About two and a half years ago I got a call from someone in the US looking for developers that could do smart contracts and I was offered a good deal. I had no idea what a smart contract was, so I looked it up online and started to learn about it. Then I called up some old developer friends back home and asked if they knew what a smart contract was. The answer was “no”. So, I said, “Well you have 3 days to learn because this is the next big thing”. I went from having a 9to5 job to also be working with NFT projects at random hours in the middle of night because of the time difference, and this became more of a well-paying side hustle. It wasn’t until I had worked for 7 or 8 projects that I realized there are also other people in Dubai who know about NFTs. This happened when I met a few Degen folks who had decided to create Arts DAO, the first DAO in the Middle East and I joined them as their Tech and Development Lead, helping to manage their first NFT drop called Ethernal Gates. I never actually bought an NFT until I started to hang out with ArtsDAO community in Dubai and people would tell each other what they bought and what they thought is going to do well. I just loved the people and the childlike environment. But the art part is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to blockchain. I do believe that soon we’ll have other use cases like birth certificates, driver’s licenses, title deeds and other government documents being the norm as NFTs. You wouldn’t need to go to an embassy or back to your home country for a lost passport for example. It’ll solve a lot of problems. Right now, though, it is solving the problems that artists had forever, provenance and royalties. Whether it’s painters, musicians, or photographers, the “creations” are minted from an artist’s wallet and that wallet can be handed down to their children and grandchildren indefinitely. The blockchain has the record of every transaction proving that the artist created the piece, the chain of custody and how much money was exchanged, and that wallet receives royalties every time the piece is sold. Imagine if Michelangelo’s family was still receiving royalties from his pieces? We’re at a point now where the internet was in the early 90’s. No one really understood the opportunities it could present. So, my advice is to go create a wallet and start exploring. Forget about investing, imagine working at Nike or Google when they first started out in a tiny office. The people who were working are now doing well for themselves financially. Blockchain technology isn’t going anywhere. It’s been over 8 years now that people have been saying it’s just a phase and we’re still here. Just google all the big players that are heavily invested in this tech, and you’ll realize that maybe not today, but five years from now everyone would need to have a crypto wallet to have access to certain services. So why not start now? And if you’re clever enough you can probably make some money trading it or investing in it. And it doesn’t matter if you’re in the working in a cubicle on the 16th floor of a high rise in the Philippines or if you’re 16 years old living in your mum’s basement in Texas. I’ve met teenagers who turned $100 into $50,000 without having to study at Harvard. These new blockchain technologies give people these kinds of opportunities. On the flip side, if you’ve already got money and want to invest in art. Well, you can’t just walk up to a Christie’s auction. You must have connections and be invited to the inner circle. NFT’s solve that problem. You can be anybody anywhere in the world and place a bid or buy whatever artwork you want. So yeah… get a wallet and start exploring please.