Introduction

Hi all, I am back with another exciting article. This time I will be touching on the Non-Fungible Token (NFT) subject again and discussing a platform for the exchange of the same called “iNFT”. Now, as some of you may be aware I am a huge High Performance Blockchain (HPB) fan so my current research centres around projects involved with HPB. This article will explain what iNFT is, showcase how it works and show you how you can mint your very own HRC-721 NFTs on the HPB chain using the iNFT platform with Metamask.

As some of you may be aware I am extremely excited about NFTs in 2021. I wrote an in-depth article on NFTs a couple of months ago. Please check it out before reading this article just so you can see how important platforms like iNFT will become this year.

See “High Performance Blockchain (HPB) Competitive Advantage with Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)” https://steemit.com/blockchain/@cryptoguru1/high-performance-blockchain-hpb-competitive-advantage-with-non-fungible-tokens-nfts

What are NFTs?

I don’t wish to dig into the details of NFTs in this article, as all of this is explained in my earlier article linked above. This will show you why NFTs are huge this year and explains how HPB has huge competitive advantages in the space. In summary Non Fungible Tokens are unique items of value. Blockchain technology has provided us the opportunity to “Tokenise” Non-Fungible Items-hence the “T” in “NFT”.

“NFTs can be considered your certificate of ownership, and utilise blockchain technology to ensure proven authenticity, ownership, and transferability” (HPB.io, 2021).

In the traditional world, these Non-Fungible Assets would be your house, car, collectibles, artwork, etc…each being different from others of their kind, and exchanged via fiat currencies, which in themselves are Fungible (non-unique), i.e., every 1-dollar bill has the same value and is not unique.

HPB’s Competitive Advantage with NFTs

In my previous article, I showcased HPBs competitive advantage with NFTs. The main one being its far cheaper costs when compared to Ethereum’s insane “Gas fees”. Most NFTs are currently on-boarded on the Ethereum chain as an ERC-721 token standard, however, HPB offers some notable user advantages in their EVM compatible HRC-721 token standard.

1. HPB does 5000 transactions per second vs Ethereum’s 20. This gives HPB better throughput.
2. Transactions are a fraction of a penny on HPB vs ETH’s multi-dollar transaction price tag. This makes HPB more cost-effective.
3. HPB’s consensus algorithm is Proof of Performance (POP) vs Ethereum’s Proof of Work (POW). HPB requires vastly less energy to mint, host and transfer NFTs thus making it more sustainable. It is in fact 1000s of times greener than ETH. I did mention in my previous article that NFT platforms using ETH are adding to the global carbon emissions crises, whilst HPB offers a greener solution.

How iNFT will solve current NFT Pain Points, using HPBs competitive advantages

This brings me to iNFT, one of the limiting factors of the NFT space in my opinion is the creation and trading of NFTs. To make an NFT, you'll want to get a representation of your unique physical or digital item, along with appropriate meta information, hashed onto the blockchain. iNFT offers an easy solution for creating and tagging an NFT on your favourite blockchain.

HPB has stipulated time and time again that they are committed to enticing NFT businesses to their platform, which makes their partnership with iNFT particularly exciting to me.

HPB, (2021) stated in their 2021 roadmap their commitment to enabling the trading of these NFTs. They chose to partner with iNFT to achieve this goal.

“Construction of an NFT Asset Trading Centre (NFT Market-place) to allow NFT assets to flow, allowing users to connect to the trading centre through HPB wallet, making it easy to create, issue, auction, and trade NFT assets so in future, Defi can be combined and explored to tap the innovative value of NFTs.” HPB.io, (2021)

I did state in my previous article that I would revisit this topic when touching on iNFT. Back then iNFT only supported Ethereum's ERC721 & ERC1155 non-fungible tokens and was planning on supporting them on HPB’s MainNet, which it now does.

What is iNFT?

Source: (Inft.io. 2021)

iNFT brands itself as one of the world’s leading NFT digital asset trading platforms. They position their platform as the go-to location for digital asset trading, irrespective of the blockchain of choice (iNFT, 2021). They further state that they utilise the best technology to create a safe, efficient, and valuable network to provide the world’s best NFT trading platform for users. Blockcast, (2021) adds that iNFT was devised as the solution to the complex useability issues surrounding NFT creation and transactions, citing the difficulty around it as its main problem.

I managed to stumble upon a few great articles during my research for this article. The founder of iNFT, Sheng Chao “Chase” was interviewed by Blockcast on the 12th April 2021, I will link this article below in the further reading section. In summary, my reading of this interview gave me great confidence in his commitment to NFTs. He has a great background in e-commerce and has founded many online stores and platforms. He was also the regional head of Meituan Dianping and is a lecturer. (Block Beats, 2021).

I agree with his viewpoint that the world is at the very early stages of NFT adoption, he goes further to state that China is lagging behind the rest of the world, but he reminds us of the huge market China offers for NFTs when they start to catch up. He mentions in the interview that he and the iNFT team have identified 25 traditional industries which would benefit from NFT use.

“iNFT was developed with the aim of becoming the world’s leading NFT trading platform, allowing users to mint, collect, auction and trade various NFTs, in an all-encompassing platform (Sheng Chao, 2021)”

Block Beats, (2021) states that iNFT only recently (early 2021) completed a seed round of fundraising. Apparently, iNFT has close ties (partnerships) with Bibox, Bitmart, HPB, MyTrade, KaKa, Crypt FIFA, to name but a few.

iNFT started off supporting Ethereum's ERC721 and ERC1155 asset protocols on their platform. They did however always indicate their commitment to adopt other blockchains such as BSC, HECO and HPB. Blockcast, (2021) also states that iNFT plans to support NFT assets on other mainstream public chains such as EOS, Polkadot and TRON, and to provide more tools to assist eco-development. It is great to see such a huge vision.

iNFT Platform Features

Source: (inft.io. 2021)

According to iNFT, (2021) they currently offer the following types of NFTs:

• Domain Names
• Virtual Worlds
• Art
• Trading Cards
• Collectibles
• Sports

Block Beats, (2021) further explains that iNFT has the following features:

1. iNFT enables Person to Person (P2P) NFT transactions: For example, person A sets a price for their NFT on iNFT, and Person B buys it.
2. iNFT enables British Auction Sales: For example, a reserve price is set by the seller at the lowest price they are willing to take (this can be 0). The price goes higher and higher if there is a lot of interest, at set bid increments, but after 3 strikes of the hammer the sale is made at the last price. This is a “first-price auction-style” as the winner pays their bid to gain the asset.
3. iNFT enables Dutch Auction Sales: Similar to the above, this is also a “first-price auction-style”, but is done in a descending fashion vs an ascending fashion as per the above. For example, the price first starts high (higher than the item will likely fetch), The price is reduced at a set time interval until a winning bidder calls “Mine” and the deal is made. This is much faster than the British auction style as there is only 1 bid per item.
4. iNFT provides Over the Counter (OTC) transaction sales: For example, two parties, the buyer and the seller, can interact between themselves on iNFT to transfer NFTs to one another.
5. iNFT provides NFT minting: iNFT has launched a minting solution for NFTs on ETH and HPB and will do the same for other chains. This will allow users to create and display their digital items on the iNFT platform for others to see, like a gallery.
6. iNFT will provides NFT blind boxes (similar to loot boxes in gaming): Allowing users and projects to launch blind boxes on the platform via the iNFT blind box centre. This will allow users to curate their collectibles via a “mystery/blind box”. This means buyers will know the overall components of the particular box, buy it but not know the exact NFT they will get, similar to packs of trading cards (Blind Boxes, 2021). This will allow digital creators to show their art to wider audiences in a fun way.

All of the above features in my opinion will make iNFT a very flexible platform, attracting a huge user base. Blockcast, (2021) further adds that in the future iNFT will have a community voting system, will provide incentives for NFT trading, and issue iNFT platform cards to lower trading fees, etc…. iNFT is only starting off and it is great to see so many live and planned features at such an early stage.

Tutorial of how to Mint your very own HRC-721 NFT on the iNFT Platform

iNFT has recently launched the ability to mint NFT assets on the HPB Main Net (HPB, 2021). This is very exciting. HPB offered an easy-to-follow guide in the article below with images, however, I will summarise them here in short.

https://medium.com/hpb-foundation/tutorial-how-to-mint-hrc-721-nft-assets-on-inft-5fc26d0f2af6

• Firstly, you must have access to a MetaMask Wallet, for those of you unfamiliar with Metamask it is a Google Chrome Extension. Available at: https://metamask.io/
• Secondly, you need to add HPB Main Network to your Metamask wallet. For those of you who may be confused by this, your Metamask wallet is an Ethereum Wallet. HPB is a different blockchain but is an Ethereum Virtual Machine Compatible chain, which means it is similar to Ethereum, and wallet addresses look the same.The image below provides an easy-to-follow guide on how to do this.

Source: HPB, (2021)
Note: For improved stability the latest advice is to use https://hpbnode.com in the New RPC URL instead of https://node.hpb.io

• Now enter the iNFT Platform (https://inft.io/), then click “Account” in the top right corner and then click into “My Items”. You then click on the “Create NFT” button to start. It is quite simple from here, so just follow all the instructions which will walk you through the creation of your very own NFT content. It is important to note that you need to ensure you are connected via your Metamask HPB Main Network and not the Ethereum Network, to ensure you mint to the HPB chain and enjoy cheap fees.
• You then work through “Create Steps” and click “Create” once done. Once this is done you need to pay the NFT minting fees via Metamask. MetaMask pops up for you to verify the transaction. Once paid you can authorize your NFT ownership and then click “Continue”. You now have your very own NFT and you can access it via “My Items” on the iNFT platform.
• As a final step, it is always nice to see your NFT on the host chain. To do this open the HPB block browser on your computer and input your NFT TX Hash here: https://hpbscan.org/

Conclusion

iNFT seems like an extremely interesting NFT trading platform with lots of exciting features which in my opinion will entice a lot of users to the platform. I am so excited that they will not only provide ETH ERC NFTs but onboard multiple chains, creating a one stop solution for NFT trading in the crypto sphere. Their partnership with HPB is particularly exciting to me as I love the HPB project (please read my previous articles).

HPB combined with iNFT now gives blockchain enthusiasts the ability to create and trade their NFTs on an easy-to-use platform, whilst at the same time being more sustainable due to HPB’s greener consensus algorithm. HPB also offers much faster speeds for the trading and moving of NFTs and is far cheaper. I believe artists need to explore HPB and iNFT, as most artists today have sustainability on their minds.

HPB in my opinion is extremely undervalued for what it offers in terms of superior technology and features in the space. Now that you can easily mint your very own NFTs on the HPB chain via iNFT just adds to this viewpoint. It is great to see HPB fulfilling their roadmap milestones quite fast in 2021.

Further information

• HPB Website: http://www.hpb.io/
• HPB Twitter: https://twitter.com/HPB_Global
• HPB Telegram: https://t.me/hpbglobal
• HPB Full White Paper: http://www.hpb.io/static/file/whitepaper/HPB_Whitepaper_English.pdf
• HPB 1 Page Summary Whitepaper: http://www.hpb.io/static/file/whitepaperA4/HPB_A4_en_%E8%8B%B1%E8%AF%AD_English.pdf
• iNFT Website: https://inft.io/
• iNFT Twitter: https://twitter.com/InftOffical
• iNFT Telegram: https://t.me/iNFTglobal
• Interview with founder of iNFT: https://blockcast.cc/interviews/blockcast-cc-exclusive-interview-with-sheng-chao-founder-of-inft-nft-is-a-solid-proof-of-the-authenticity-and-ownership-of-digital-assets/

References

• Block Beats, 2021. NFT asset trading platform INFT has recently completed. [online] Block Beats. Available at: https://www.theblockbeats.com/en/flash/31102 [Accessed 9 June 2021].
• Blockcast, 2021. Blockcast.cc Exclusive Interview with Sheng Chao, Founder of iNFT “NFT is a solid proof of the authenticity and ownership of digital assets”. [online] Available at: https://blockcast.cc/interviews/blockcast-cc-exclusive-interview-with-sheng-chao-founder-of-inft-nft-is-a-solid-proof-of-the-authenticity-and-ownership-of-digital-assets/ [Accessed 9 June 2021].
• Blind Boxes, 2021. Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs) Reimagined — Blind Boxes announces an IDO on BSCPAD. [online] Medium. Available at: https://medium.com/blind-boxes/non-fungible-tokens-nfts-reimagined-blind-boxes-announces-an-ido-on-bscpad-51fd30f96479 [Accessed 13 June 2021].
• Hpb.io. 2021. HPB 2021 Roadmap. [online] Available at: https://www.hpb.io/post-550 [Accessed 13th June 2021]
• HPB, 2021. Tutorial | How to mint HRC-721 NFT assets on iNFT. [online] Medium. Available at: https://medium.com/hpb-foundation/tutorial-how-to-mint-hrc-721-nft-assets-on-inft-5fc26d0f2af6 [Accessed 12 June 2021].
• iNFT, 2021. [online] Inft.io. Available at: https://inft.io/ [Accessed 9 June 2021].