It seems like everyone is getting into NFTs these days, so why should one of the world’s most popular apps be any different? Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced that Instagram will soon allow users to display NFTs and perhaps even mint them, reports Engadget.

“We’re working on bringing NFTs to Instagram in the near term,” Zuckerberg said this week, speaking at SXSW. “I’m not ready to kind of announce exactly what that’s going to be today. But, over the next several months, the ability to bring some of your NFTs in, hopefully over time [you’ll] be able to mint things within that environment.”
Of course, NFTs on social media networks are not new. Twitter began allowing Twitter Blue subscribers on iOS to use an NFT as their profile picture earlier this year, as AdWeek noted. However, the company stopped well short of allowing users to mint their own NFTs. The ability for a user to mint their own NFTs on Instagram would be a step far beyond what Twitter allows. Though Zuckerberg did not mention it, if NFTs on Instagram become commonplace, it’s possible Meta could turn the app into a type of NFT marketplace, creating a revenue stream beyond advertising, which is an increasingly challenging business.
Zuckerberg also said Meta’s NFT ambitions go well beyond Instagram. In the future, Zuckerberg sees NFTs blended in with the burgeoning metaverse that the company is working on, saying, “I would hope that, you know, the clothing that your avatar is wearing in the metaverse, you know, can be basically minted as an NFT and you can take it between your different places. There’s like a bunch of technical things that need to get worked out before that’ll really be seamless to happen.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael Grothaus is a novelist, journalist, and former screenwriter. His debut novel EPIPHANY JONES is out now from Orenda Books. You can read more about him at MichaelGrothaus.com More

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