NFT is the latest driving force for the popularity of blockchain in 2021. After ICO and Smart contract a few years ago, my expectation was that decentralized identity would be the next thing. Yet I was somewhat wrong, NFT is the thing that caught real public attention now. That’s why we need to talk about it today.
今年是2021年，NFT 是最新的让区块链流行起来的驱动力。在几年前的 ICO 和智能合约热潮之后，我自己曾经觉得下一波的热潮应该来自去中心化身份，但是显然我没有想到 NFT 才是这一波真正进入大众视野的概念，所以今天咱们就一起好好学习一下 NFT 。
NFT is short for Non-fungible Token. Non-fungible means an NFT is un-replaceable is unique in this world. For example, a painting. While, on the other hand, there are lots of things that are fungible. Like, a shirt as a commodity, if one is broken, you pay the price, you get another one.
NFT 是英文 Non-fungible Token ，不可替换的，意思就是世界上独一无二的，例如，一幅油画作品，而有些东西其实可以替换的，例如商店里的一件衬衫，一样的价格，几乎买多少件都买得到，穿坏了，再买一件就好。
An NFT is a unit of data stored on a digital ledger, called a blockchain, which can be sold and traded. Token is a cryptography term, before NFT, there has been a lot of other tokens, that are fungible. We don’t need to go to the technical details（if you do want, check Ethereum ERC721 standard）, as long as we know, NFTs are all on some blockchain, that’s why they are also called tokens.
一个 NFT 就是一段存储在区块链上的数据，可以进行交易，买入或者卖出。Token 是一个密码学的术语了， NFT 之前，某些区块链上就有了代币了，也都叫 token ，只不过它们一般都是可替换的。关于技术细节我们不用太深究(如果特别像知道到底一个 NFT 底层长成啥样，可以参考以太坊的 ERC721标准)，只需要知道 NFT 是发行在区块链上的，所以我们把它也叫 token 。
You may wonder if an NFT is just a piece of data, which can be easily copied, why it could be so expensive.
你可能奇怪，既然 NFT 就是一段数据，那么谁都可以拷贝呀，为啥还会有人出钱买呢？
First of all, it is not just any piece of data, it is something interesting to people, like digital collectibles, say a kitty, or a painting. There are other things, which we will talk about later. Secondly, a blockchain is an open database, if an NFT represents a painting, then I can buy this NFT from its owner, if the NFT is transferred to my blockchain address, then I become the owner of the painting. If you can trade sth, you can apply a price to it. But note here, just being the owner of this NFT, does not mean I hold all the copyrights of this painting. Copyright is usually made clear when the transaction happens.
首先，NFT 数据并不是任意的数据，而是一段人们会感兴趣的数据，例如数字收藏品，例如一幅油画，一个数字宠物。稍后我们还会看到很多实际案例。另外，区块链是一个公开的账本，所以，如果一个 NFT 指向一个数字绘画作品，那么购买了 NFT 就意味着，我拥有了这个作品了，可交易，就会有价格。但是拥有是一回事，享有版权，copyright 是另外一回事。并不是说，我们拥有一个数字作品了，就可以无限制的使用这个作品了。具体要看购买的时候的版权声明。
If you are still not excited, and saying OK it’s sth beautiful, it’s tradable, so what? Usually, it is because you are missing the big picture, and you don’t understand the paradigm shift behind NFT. The virtual world, now called Metaverse, is getting more attractive. If you don’t understand why people pay for virtual land and build virtual houses on it. It’s hard to see the importance of NFT. But this is a bigger topic, which I may cover in future videos.
但是很多人还是觉得没什么，艺术作品从来就有，不用 NFT ，用其他方式不是一样可以交易吗？其实在往下就不是那么好解释了，因为需要让大家对虚拟的世界，现在叫 Metaverse ，发生兴趣。要理解一个大的范式转换，往往需要比较大的知识储备的。如果你不明白为啥会有人花钱买虚拟的土地，然后建设虚拟的房子，那么你就很难理解 NFT 在虚拟世界中扮演一个多么重要的角色，在未来人类社会会扮演多么重要的一个角色。如果虚拟世界现在还让你激动不起来，那请期待我后续的专门讨论这个话题的视频。
Now, it’s getting interesting, let’s check some real world usecases of NFT.
下面来看点好玩的，看看现实世界中的 NFT 的一些应用。
Jack Dorsey is the founder of twitter. He sent a tweet when he just set up the app. Now people paid nearly 3 million dollars for this tweet as an NFT.
Jack Dorsey 是 twitter 的创世人。他当年把应用搭好之后，发了一条推文，现在有人用将近3百万美金购买了这条推文对应的 NFT 。
In 2017, the American studio Larva Labs released CryptoPunks, a project to trade unique cartoon characters, on the Ethereum blockchain. It is nothing but a low-resolution avatar. I don’t think people bought these because they are artful, Note here, they are avatars, so, it has a lot to do with who you are in Metaverse, it is your decentralized identity I mentioned earlier.
2017年，美国的 larva Labs 发布了 CryptoPunks, 就是一些卡通人物，用到的区块链是以太坊。其实就是一些低分辨率的头像。很显然人们买它不是因为这些头像有多艺术，而是它能在虚拟世界中代表一个人的身份，还记得我刚才提到过的去中心化身份吗？
In 2018, Decentraland, a blockchain-based virtual world, raised $26 million in an initial coin offering.
2018年的，Decentraland ，是一个虚拟世界项目。项目融资2600万美金。
In 2019, Nike patented a system called CryptoKicks that would use NFTs to verify the authenticity of physical sneakers and give a virtual version of the shoe to the customer.
2019年，Nike 注册了 CtyptoKicks 的专利，用 NFT 来保证用户不会买到假耐克鞋。
In early 2020, Dapper Labs, released NBA TopShot, a project to sell tokenized collectibles of NBA highlights.
2020年，Dapper Labs 发布了 NBA TopShots, 卖的是 NBA 的精彩瞬间，这次不是图片了，是视频。
For more NFTs ，goto https://opensea.io/ , which is considered the largest NFT market right now.
如果想看更多的 NFT ，可以去 opensea ，这是目前最大的 NFT 交易市场了。
So, that’s it. To put it simply, A NFT is a unique token released on a blockchain. It represents a piece of data that is tradable. Peter, here, see you in the next video. Bye.
好，就说这些了。简单来说，一个 NFT 就是区块链上发行的独一无二的代币，指向一段来交易的数据。我是 Peter ，下个视频里面咱们再见。