Bremen – Werder Bremen wants to keep up with the times and is the first second division club to offer a collection of digital shirts. This is done on an NFT basis. But what does that mean exactly?
It used to be “MFG”, now it’s “NFT“: The change of the digital age always brings with it new abbreviations. In the future, fans of Werder Bremen to get used to. Because the second division football team is the first club in the league to dare to take a big step, which is also a test. One appears for the first time complete collection of jerseys of Werder in digital form. But is NFT really good?
Werder Bremen are the first second division football team to use an NFT-based digital jersey collection
No shame if you don’t know what to do with the NFT abbreviation at first. fans of Werder Bremenwho are only too happy to take advantage of offers from their heart club, should “Non-fungible tokens“ meet more often in the future. Because Werder will offer a first collection of digital jerseys in NFT from Wednesday, April 13, 2022. In cooperation with the Munich start-up “The Football Company” (TFC) “will be virtual merchandise created to offer and use them in the market within the TFC application”. This is how Werder put it on its website.
The partnership between Werder Bremen and TFC should include, among other things, creating current jersey collections right up to popular retro jerseys from the most successful decades of the von der Weser team’s more than 120-year club history. There is also talk of making other officially licensed NFT items. If you still have the green and white question marks written on your forehead, you can follow the thought behind it step by step. NFT to understand.
Werder Bremen dabble in NFTs – but what are ‘non-fungible tokens’ really?
“Non-fungible tokens” (NFT), in German something like “non-replaceable tokens”, are basically nothing more than digital unique coins. So you can’t match it with a match like it does at Niclas refill carafe and Marvin Ducksch apply to each other, can be mapped or replaced.
In other words: the NFTs, who now also aspire to promotion Werder Bremen can be considered a kind of digital proof of ownership or authenticity. Unlike cryptocurrencies, especially bitcoins, these NFTS but do not exchange them with each other. On the contrary, they are individual, unique and therefore very competitive in terms of price. scarcity and above all depending on the respective demand. This means: without appropriate interested parties, the NFT sale is more than difficult.
NFTs come in different forms – and Werder specializes in digital jerseys
Conversely, it also means that if the demand is very high, the price could NFT increase rapidly in a short time. This is what many investors are hoping for, and above all Werder Bremenface to digital jersey collection could open up a whole new market. Of course, there is no certainty about this.
In principle, a large number of “Non-fungible tokens” to be distinguished. present themselves above all NFT in the form of images or videos, but in general they can represent almost anything and ultimately are not limited to a single domain. Thus, NFTs can also be music, domain names or even virtual real estate. Or just different digital jerseys, like her Werder Bremen now on the market.
Werder Bremen wants to approach young fans with NFT-based shirts
The club communicates that the “digital[n] Transformation in a globalized world”. To finish, “Communication and consumer’s behavior“especially with the younger target group changed enormously. So says Nico Hruby, Chief Digital Officer (CDO) Werder Bremen.
Our claim is that we have the courage to innovate. We have been following the development of NFTs for some time. We want to help shape it from the start, learn from it, and constantly improve our offerings through fan and partner feedback.
However, critical consideration of the carbon footprintthe double winner from 2004 to his NFT– Commitment is also very important. In this respect, partner TFC chose its technology base “with care and foresight”. In fact, one would be more energy efficient than other solutions and consume less energy to create an NFT than to do a Google search.
Werder Bremen offers digital jerseys in a special app
But how is it supposed to work? NFT Jersey Shop from Werder Bremen design in practice? The TFC app is free to download and fully usable without purchasing NFT. People who do not want to invest money are therefore not excluded. But who decides to sell virtual goods in the form of Werder Bremen digital jerseys the purchase can also thus express its attachment to the Greens-Whites.
For the digital jersey collection advertises on an NFT basis Werder Bremen on a large scale and at the same time gives insight into the underlying concept. Shirts with player names should have different added values depending on the rarity of the shirt. These then range from points bonuses in the TFC app to exclusive dating events – in real life. a way 8:30 p.m. to April 13 the virtual jerseys can then be purchased in “sports bags”. These are randomly assembled packs of three jerseys.
Werder Bremen fans react harshly to NFT kits – ‘don’t accept all the bullshit’
The big question: the virtual jerseys of Werder Bremen met with a positive response from the loyal fan base at all? On the corresponding announcement tweet including a short intro video NFT collection react the Twitter Followers very divided by Werder. Sometimes there is helplessness as to what “NFT” actually means, sometimes the announcement is reacted to with pure misunderstanding and bewilderment.
“God, it would be nice if your own club didn’t participate in all the bullshit. Especially when it’s just bullshit,” is just one of the hateful reactions Twitter on the digital jersey collection of Werder. You don’t have to follow every trend, the sustainability of this campaign is also important NFT-based is always in question.
The environmental friendliness of NFT products must be seriously questioned
Even though Werder Bremen in its press release positively to carbon footprint partner TFC points out: The general criticism of the influence of NFT on the environment cannot be dismissed out of hand. High CO₂ emissions during production are criticized, although this also happens with other technologies.
The “Handelsblatt” is already questioning the durability and durability of NFTs. The “allure of the new” would “wear itself out quickly”, a lot would go with the global community of investors stand and fall. Means: If their interest in NFTin whatever form falls, a market threatens to disappear.
NFT production is often not a sustainable concept – just a “climate killer”?
Especially the influence of NFT Production on the environment is discussed again and again negatively. It should be too Werder Bremen awareness. Esquire magazine even describes NFTs as “climate killer” and gives a short technical digression.
NFT are based on Blockchain Ethereumwhich uses a mechanism called “proof of workbegins. Technically, the computer solves complex puzzles to add new blocks to the blockchain. So that too much “money” is not generated too quickly, the difficulty of these tasks is artificially increased.
This leads to an arms race. Of course, faster PCs solve puzzles in less time. And new puzzles, in turn, slow down computers. As a result, more performance is required, but this is increasingly slowed down by more difficult tasks. Of course, this is not a sustainable concept.
Werder Bremen emphasizes sustainability of digital jersey NFT production – less power consumption than one Netflix user per year
But that’s exactly where it starts Werder Bremen with the production of digital jerseys on NFT-based on. For sustainability reasons, you put TFCwhich in turn involves the use of flow blockchain (FLOW) prescribed. The club claims that, unlike Ethereum, FLOW relies on the “Proof-of-Stake” consensus model, “which operates much more energy-efficiently than the “Proof-of-Work” model used by Ethereum or Bitcoin” .
The reason is: it does “without the time- and energy-intensive mining”. Explicitly underlined Werder Brementhat the NFT the first collection uses “less overall energy than an average Netflix user per year”.
Besides Werder Bremen, Eintracht Frankfurt and VfL Wolfsburg also rely on NFT products
Are other football clubs aware of this technology? Because the next Werder Bremen are with Eintracht Frankfurt and the VfL Wolfsburg two current first division clubs in the world of NFT Between.
While Wolves offers digital trading cards to players through the “Fanzone” company, the Frankfurt-based company is focusing on a range of merchandise for fans. A sin Werder Bremen also count digital jerseys. How do you think shirt swapping works here?