If you were on the internet in the late 2000s, you discovered LimeWire, the peer-to-peer music sharing service that eventually ran into legal trouble with record labels before shutting down in 2010.
With its distinctive green logo and dense user interface, LimeWire encapsulated the Napster era when just about everything, legal or not, was possible online.
Fast-forward to 2022 and LimeWire is back, thanks to two Austrian entrepreneur brothers, Julian and Paul Zehetmayr, who acquired the naming rights to the service.
NFT LimeWire
Plan? NFT, of course, with a focus on music. As CNBC reports, LimeWire will relaunch in May as a purpose-built NFT marketplace for buying rare music items such as limited editions, unreleased demos, and digital goods.
Interestingly, the service will be denominated in US dollars, not cryptocurrencies, and users will be able to purchase tokens with standard credit cards, in partnership with a startup called Wyre.
Are NFTs a smart bet?
According to Julian Zehetmayr, the reasoning behind the focus on NFTs, rather than cryptocurrency trading, is quite simple.
“The problem with the NFT market is that most of the platforms are decentralized,” he told CNBC. "If you look at bitcoin, every exchange makes it easy to buy, trade, and sell bitcoin. No one really does the same in the NFT space."
While NFTs were indeed one of the most popular types of digital assets in 2021, their star looks less bright in 2022. According to NonFungible, the average selling price of an NFT has fallen to around €2,000, down from a all-time high of €6,900 in January. 2. Part of the decline occurred after Russia attacked Ukraine.
The industry is also very consolidated around some crypto wallets. Chainalaysis research in January showed that around 32,000 wallets held 80% of the total value. In 2021, users spent around €41 billion on NFTs.