Introduction

#293.

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When I was a kid, my favorite thing in the world was collecting sports cards. Baseball cards, football cards, basketball cards…you name it.

My prized possession was a 1989 Barry Sanders Score rookie card – which my best friend Mike DeCoursey tried many times, to no avail, to pry from my possession via underwhelming trade offers and eventually an attempted five finger discount which ended poorly for him.

Little did I know, the world of trading cards would provide an early education for understanding this burgeoning new field of the mysterious NFT, or non-fungible token.

A token is simply an object that represents something else. In the case of my Barry Sanders rookie card, the card itself is a “token” that represents Barry Sanders and his Hall of Fame level performance as a football player. Fans of football and Barry Sanders want to get their hands on this valuable token, or trading card. Since there was only a limited supply of Barry Sanders rookie cards printed, the demand drives up the monetary value of this card.

What’s really important to understand here is the community of fans are what give value to this otherwise meaningless piece of cardboard with a picture of Barry Sanders on it.

If you can wrap your brain around why trading cards are valuable, or any collectible for that matter, you’ll be able to understand why NFTs, non-fungible tokens, are exploding in popularity in the digital space…and hold the potential to revolutionize the world the way the internet did 25 years ago.

2021 was the “year of the NFT,” and you cant go anywhere on the internet without hearing about it. But I was quick to dismiss NFTs, because everything I heard about them sounded like JPEGs of apes getting sold for $50,000 which made no sense to me. I was going to wait it out.

And when I started trying to learn about NFTs, my head was spinning with things I didn’t understand, like the blockchain, DAOs, web 2.0 vs 3.0…it was all overwhelming and over my head.

But when I finally started to grasp these concepts and see the enormous potential in the future of NFTs, it was like walking through a one-way door: I couldn’t go back.

The most influential person to waking me up to the power of NFTs is a very good friend of the show, and Great Man Mastermind brother, Brad Barrett.

Who is Brad Barrett?

• The co-host of one of the world’s largest financial podcasts, ChooseFI
• The FI community has helped millions of people get on the path to financial independence through planning, saving and smart investing
• Brad is a great guide for the NFT discussion because his roots in financial independence are rooted in conservative, prudent, long-term investing

We wanted to do a beginner level intro conversation to the world of NFTs so you can start to educate yourself on the space, and point to other excellent resources – podcasts - that Brad has vetted for you to continue your education.

This is the first episode of a 2 part series with Brad:

In this Episode:

• NFTs explained, in plain English
• Why Brad was skeptical about crypto, blockchain and NFTs, and what made him a believer
• A beginner level definition of the Blockchain
• How understanding trading cards can help you understand NFTs
• Working definition of Web 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0
• Why Brad cautions looking at NFTs as investing, and more speculative, because it is so early and the wild wild west It’s important to note that I have not yet taken the plunge financially in NFTs – so I do not currently own NFTs. Brad on the other hand does own what I would consider to be a substantial amount of NFTs, even though it only represents a very small portion of his net worth.

Where to Go From Here: Resources

Bankless Podcast Episode #1: Welcome to Bankless

Tim Ferriss Podcast, Episode #542: Chris Dixon and Naval Ravikant — The Wonders of Web3, How to Pick the Right Hill to Climb, Finding the Right Amount of Crypto Regulation, Friends with Benefits, and the Untapped Potential of NFTs 

Bankless, Episode #90: 5 Mental Models for Web 3.0 with Chris Dixon

Impact Theory with Tom Bilyeu: Understand and Leverage Web 3, NFT’s and the Future of Blockchain Technology