Just one year ago, NFTs remained largely outside mainstream public discourse, known and understood only by fringe groups of crypto enthusiasts. By the end of 2021, however, the phenomenon had grown into a $41 billion industry. An NFT, or “non-fungible token”, refers to verifiable ownership of digital material through the use of blockchain technology. At the outset, the digital ‘material’ being bought and sold online mostly consisted of digital art, however, as the year progressed, creators and programmers consistently stretched the boundaries of the term. Tweets, virtual clothing, and even sequences of DNA all sold for increasingly large sums in 2021 as investors and fans rushed to purchase them in the form of NFTs. 

NFTs function by way of smart contracts, which power the tokens’ transferability and verification of ownership. Still, despite their critical role in the production and trading of NFTs, smart contracts and their importance remain less discussed.

What are Smart Contracts?

Like traditional contracts, smart contracts are used anytime two parties wish to establish terms and mutual obligations through a binding contract. The difference between them lies primarily in smart contracts’ utilization of blockchain technology, which allows for decentralized, transparent, and automated agreement execution, without the need for traditional third party involvement. 

NFTs are minted through smart contracts that assign original ownership, while still allowing for transferability. When someone mints an NFT, they execute code stored in smart contracts that conform to different standards, such as the most commonly used standard: ERC-721.

Where does Lexyom come in?

Lexyom creates custom smart contracts for minting NFTs, producing a totally unique body of code for each individual client. Where platforms such as OpenSea operate through a shared hosting system, thereby negating one of the central premises of the crypto ethos: decentralization, Lexyom works to write smart contracts free from the oversight of a single authority. What would happen should such large platforms go down for maintenance?

Centralized conformity to pre-existing standards entails a general loss of security by way of overreliance on a single authority to execute code. 

Beyond this, Lexyom offers a smart contracting auditing service, for clients seeking to verify the credibility and strength of already existing contracts. Their team of Web 3 developers brings years of project experience to review the contract and ensure it functions clearly, coherently, with the full validity and transparency necessary to guarantee client satisfaction. Smart contract auditing serves as a final stamp of approval from an accredited legal service provider.

For more information, or to learn how you can create or audit your own smart contracts, visit www.lexyom.com

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