A clutch of well known artists and entertainers are joining a new tech company's digital marketplace to sell ownership tokens for their works or their time.
An FNT ownership token for the artwork "Sup", displayed in front of the original work, at a launch by Japanese artist Yasumasa Yonehara. Photo: AFP
Non-fungible tokens or NFTs are digital certifications of ownership that can be sold to investors, either whole or broken up into pieces, in the form of blockchain technology - a digital tally designed to be tamper-proof.
New Auckland-based NFT business, Glorious, aims to create a New Zealand NFT marketplace, due to launch in October.
The company has partnered with a number of high-profile New Zealanders, including Dan Carter, Six60, Neil Finn and Dick Frizzell to help market and facilitate the sale of their work to investors, for which it takes a percentage.
Glorious chief executive Tim Harper said the NFT business model would help artists monetise their work.
"Uploading your work to the internet, somebody can come along and steal it, they can take it, they can copy it and you have got no control over it.
"Where the blockchain technology comes in now for the first time in the history of the internet, an artist can upload something, attach a contract to that work which basically proves that this is an authentic, scarce digital work that can't be copied," he said.
Artists would be able to get perpetual royalties, enabling the creator to get a return on all future sales, Harper said.
Dan Carter is backing soon-to-launch NFT marketplace Glorious. Photo: PHOTOSPORT
The NFTs aren't confined to art, membership-based products and sales of rights and access will also be on offer, for example access to celebrities.
The company said this could include things like a ride on the one-of-a-kind SailGP team's F50 boat, guaranteed front row seats at a Six60 concert or a kicking session with former All Black Dan Carter.
Harper said the global NFT market saw explosive growth in the past 12 months, with sales in excess of $2.5 billion, and he expects there would be an appetite among local investors and collectors for the products.
However, he said the size of the of the domestic market is unknown at this stage.
Harper was coy about who its investors had been to date, but said the company had raised millions in its early funding rounds.
It was not looking to raise capital any time soon, he said.