Nothing can resist the NFT hype, and fans are asking questions
Nothing, the consumer technology company started by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei and known for its aggressive marketing, unveiled a non-fungal token project called Black Dot. Fans are skeptical.
Black Dot is a video clip with a rotating, transparent cube with a black dot that bounces off the walls inside and creates a sharp, metallic sound. The visuals are cool and match the earbuds and the smartphone manufacturer’s minimalist aesthetics – kudos for that. The question is: why NFT?
Nothing allows equity finance investors to redeem the collectibles using self-deposit wallets like MetaMask. After the NFTs fall on July 7, it will open for sale to the public on the OpenSea market. It is unclear how much the company prices the bouncing dots or which blockchain it uses.
The startup, founded in late 2020 and backed by Google Ventures, has been relatively successful in capturing the attention of technology enthusiasts and influencers. Despite the hype marketing, Nothing’s cordless earbuds and upcoming Android-based phone breathed some fresh air into the increasingly homogeneous consumer technology area.
But fans seem less impressed with the NFT move. As of Wednesday, the most liked comments on the Instagram post about Black Dot have been overwhelmingly negative. “You have clearly lost the action,” says one user. “For a waste of resources on something completely useless. Instead, focus your money on developing the phone or other technology,” snaps another.
The fans have a point. Nothing, based in London, promises to be differentlike offering transparent earbuds for just $ 99 and smartphones with illuminated light strips, so it probably has to spend a lot more on custom manufacturing – made in southern China – and quality control than its competitors with a more utilitarian approach to hardware design.
The company’s unwanted description of the NFT project is unlikely to convince critics. Or maybe I lack vision.
“We are all nothing. Dots in the enormously improbable layout of everything. But let these seemingly small, insignificant dots connect. Then something begins. New is imagined. Faith becomes real. Community rules.”
To be fair, merging web3 functionality and smartphone technology has been done by serious blockchain organizations. Solana, one of the most popular blockchain networks, turned a few heads last month when it launched its web3-based handset, which aims to make interaction with blockchain services easier on mobile (at the moment it is very limited).
And NFTs are not all driven by greed. Technology is seen as a useful way to authenticate one’s membership in a community or access to an event, which in theory helps reduce fraud.
But introducing NFTs days before Nothing’s first phone launch could reject customers who associate NFTs with scams, speculative behavior or exclusive social clubs, given the exorbitant price tags of some collectibles before the recent cryptocurrency.
Instead of claiming an animated cube with a vague artist’s statement, perhaps nothing can think harder about the direction it wants to take in web3 – provided the management is positive on the pitch. Say if the phone will really be crypto-friendly, make sure the actual user experience lives up to expectations.
In fact, nothing has gone wrong with Polygon, the well-funded startup that works to scale transactions on the Ethereum network. The couple, according to blockchain publication Decrypt, will integrate decentralized apps, games, payments and an identity solution into the Nothing phone.
Update: Added details about the Polygon partnership.
