The rapidly evolving landscape of blockchain and cryptocurrency has long been taking over the art world. Once only available to a few, the disruption of the NFT industry through blockchain has made art, or ‘digital art’ accessible to everyone, far beyond the VIPs and the exclusives of art galleries. From the advent of Banksy to the proliferation of Crypto Punks, the modern art world has become surrounded by digital collectibles.
The rise of NFTs through blockchain technology are bringing the possibility of art ownership to masses. Several companies across the world of web3 use it for far more than just that, using NFTs and digital art as membership cards, utility packs and more. As the crypto winter seems to be a thing of the past with each passing day, creators and founders are developing technologies that aim to add tangible value to NFTs, beyond them being just a JPEG.
Andras Kristof, CEO and co-founder of Galaxis, experienced the entanglement and boom of NFTs firsthand. Through his time working with Yahoo and Wiki.com to founding Galaxis, Andras got exposed to NFTs well before the initial Beeple hype. He was also the first person to build Tembusu Terminals, a Bitcoin ATM in Singapore in 2013. International Business Times got the opportunity to speak with Andras to learn about his experiences, what he’s working on and where he sees the industry moving next.
Q: Andras, could you share your background on how you started with Yahoo, and how you got into the NFT space ?
Yahoo was great, but the journey did not start there, it began way earlier when ZX81 was Sinclair’s first computer, on which I spent hours learning programming, and that’s how it all began.
I left Yahoo for a small startup called Wiki.com, which we later sold to Rakuten for $200M dollars.
After that, I started my own ventures as I knew it was actually possible to turn an idea into reality and that’s when I really got into Web3 as we built our first bitcoin ATM in Singapore in 2013. We also got exposed to NFTs way before the hype.
All of this intrigued us to progress further, get closer to the foundation that these technologies were built on such as ownership, interoperability and more which gradually led me up to start Galaxis. Now we’ve been in Galaxis for the last 3 years and are excited to see where this takes us.
Q: Galaxis was formerly known as Ether Cards, how did it evolve to become what it is today?
When we were exposed to NFTs we quickly realised what they are good for, and things they aren’t good for. Galaxis was started because we were doing an educational project for which we got a grant for ETH foundation and we realised that there’s a smoother, sustainable way of doing it. For example, If i want to create a course, you and 9 other people can give me funding for it. So you give me the funding and I give you a membership card. So when the course is ready, you can use that membership card (NFT) and enter the course. so the main thing is now you have value on that NFT (membership card). IN this way, it is possible to create a sustainable economy, and it supports and encourages sustainable communities instead of speculative ones based on kickstarter programs.
The razor sharp focus on utility and sustainability, the ability to give an ownable object to community creators to hand to their communities, and create sustainability within a community is a unique trait of Galaxis. As long as you can provide value towards your community, they will keep supporting you, which is our biggest value proposition.
Another biggest trait is once you create your community on galaxis, even galaxis will not be able to shut you down, giving you COMPLETE ownership. We don’t want to become our own police. We want to provide tech, infrastructure and a platform for creators to create and own their community.
Q: How do you feel about NFT technology overall and its potential for mass adoption?
The whole NFT thing started with Beeple, to oversimplify things. That was unprecedented. This proved that people understood that when they buy an NFT, they did not buy a JPEG, despite the popular fud. People knew that they were paying for the certificate that gave them the ownership right, from the creator.
People didn’t care that these JPEGs were available on Google images. But people wanted the ownership rights, and they paid for it. This shows that people, if they have choice, will pay for ownership. Imagine that, as an artist, you don’t have to hide your art, sue your fanbase, or anything else. Just give them a right to ownership and they will gladly pay you. This was just the start.
Just like NFTs, lots of things faced backlash, even the internet. Speculative bubbles for NFTs, for better or worse, have lingered around for long enough. A lot of us will start using NFTs for important things. Everyone wants to know the time, but not everyone uses expensive luxury watches to do so.
The market needs to sink down into boring-ness. Web developers were like mini celebrities in the 90s, now, they’re the norm. The same will happen with NFTs, if you’re not using it, you’re missing out.
These NFTs will not be of speculative value, as they are today, but they will be the norm, pieces and certificates of ownership for one, and different utilities.
Galaxis is providing the tools for it to become boring-ness. We call it the post-hype NFT platform, a critical infrastructure for mass adoption, when it does happen.
Q: Galaxis has been involved in several celebrity NFT drops. Can you give us some insight on how they came about and what impact it’s had on Galaxis’ growth?
We’ve been very blessed that all these projects came to us, to work with us. It’s been a brilliant journey and all through word of mouth. We cannot overstate the importance of ChainLink, the most important business partner. For example: LaMelo Ball came through Chainlink, so we are thankful to them.
We’re going to maintain white glove services to specific projects, but we expect 99% of the projects to be able to deploy their NFTs or membership cards through our platform the same way as Mike Tyson or others did, completely on their own, hassle free, without any technical expertise or effort. We hope that will free up the resources to do some amazing things.
Q: Circling back to earlier, despite NFTs on the rise again, there’s been a fair share of critics. Can you elaborate more on how Galaxis addresses those concerns?
Are NFTs good for artists? No, not just that, they’re part of the critical internet infrastructure with which, anyone can provide ownable volume, to anyone else. Not just artists, or collectors, or communities. but anyone.
For example, having a user account on Netflix/Amazon Prime Video, instead of that, Netflix could provide a membership card (NFT), allowing users to store this NFT in their wallet, making them eligible for the services that Netflix/Amazon Prime Video etc provides. Based on the properties of my card, I am eligible for more or less services. In this way, as Netflix / Amazon, you don’t need to collect any personal information or data on me, you don’t need to know my name, email, password etc. All you need to do is identify if that person owns the membership card (NFTs).
Another huge application is privacy, it’s what we all love. no more worrying about data breaches for companies.
Q: As a founder of Galaxis, what is your long term vision for the platform?
NFTs can do much more than artists and collectors, but artists are the first foot in the door of global markets.
Long term vision is to provide a much better, sustainable way, to run businesses to provide value to customers or community members. Customers by giving them ownership of certain things. This way, we can enable companies to provide value and receive payment from customers without going to third parties.
This way, companies can fund things that are very important.
Galaxis’ long term goal is to change how business is conducted worldwide.
Disclaimer: The Industry Talk section features insights by crypto industry players and is not a part of the editorial content of Cryptonews.com.
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