Smart Authentic Tokenized Assets

Provide physical hardware with a cryptographic identity and "smart" functionality by creating a digital twin utilizing metadata and NFTs.

Electrical engineer w/ 13yrs experience in startups & Fortune X companies designing robots, phones, cameras, sensors,and other cool hardware

Summary

The NFT ("Nifty") Nixie is a custom designed Nixie tube clock.  This is a real hardware product which acts as a proof-of-concept for demonstrating a method of tokenizing a physical asset using metadata, public key cryptography, NFTs, and blockchain.

Technical Overview

Through the magic of elliptical curve cryptography, the NFT ("Nifty") Nixie hardware can be validated as authentic by providing a unique random signature to an authentication query.  The signature can be verified as authentic by referencing the public key located in the corresponding NFT's metadata. The private key is encrypted and locked inside the hardware forever, but the device can still use the key to generate its own signatures.

Along with the private key, a certificate chain of trust is used to prove that each key is authentic and signed by the same trusted root certificate.  The device and signer certificates are locked inside the device and the root certificate will be permanently added to the Cardano blockchain via transaction metadata. 

The hardware architecture is also designed to allow for secure control over the device which means it is feasible for the system to check if someone owns an NFT before allowing certain functionality.

Cardano is a good fit for this concept because of the low cost requirement for adding metadata to the blockchain.  The security is also very high in that the risk the information needed to prove authenticity disappears is only as big as the risk of the Cardano blockchain shutting down.

For a complete technical deep dive, please review this post on Substack: https://nftnixie.substack.com/p/nft-nixie-technical-deep-dive-part

Real World Parallels

A simple parallel to the "old world" would be a car title and the associated physical car. The car title establishes legal ownership of the car. Within the title, there is a VIN number, which links the paper certificate to the physical item because the same VIN number is also embedded into the vehicle. The state holds a centralized database of registered cars and their VIN numbers along with the details of the legal owner. If your personal information is listed on the car title, you can match the VIN number on the paper to the VIN number on the car to prove its yours.

In this project, the NFT would act as the car title. However, the NFT is also capable of acting as a car key. There can also be multiple car keys, each giving the driver a different max allowable speed to drive (for example). The state's centralized database is replaced with the metadata permanently written to the Cardano blockchain.  And finally, having access to the wallet holding the NFT replaces all of the personal information of the owner listed on the title.

Inspiration

1. Beeple sold an NFT representing one of his digital artworks.  He also mailed a copy of the physical artwork along with a paper certificate and hair sample to the buyer.  He claims the hair sample was from a Beeple stuffed animal, but there are rumors that he used his own hair...  There must be a better way to prove authenticity!   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rT13eQOf6ho&t=2087s

1. Uniswap's Unisocks project produced 500 pairs of physical socks brandished with pink unicorns and the Uniswap logo. 1 fungible SOCKS token could be redeemed for a SOCKS NFT and an associated pair of physical socks.  To my knowledge, there is no way to prove the physical socks are not counterfeit.

1. The New Balance and IOHK Realchain & OMN1S concept allowed anyone to physically scan a NFC tag embedded in a pair of shoes to prove authenticity.  To my knowledge, the shoes had no digital representation, the tags were only used as a method for tracking ownership and proving authenticity.

 Philosophy Questions

• Which asset holds value?  The NFT or the physical? 
• If an asset has both a physical and digital representation, does that give it more value? 
• If the physical asset is destroyed or damaged how does that affect the value of the NFT? 
• If I lose access to the NFT, I might no longer be able to use the physical asset (depending on implementation). How does that affect the value of the physical asset?

Status

After 2 hardware builds and 4-5 months of hardware and software development, 20 fully functional proof-of-concept prototypes are already built and in hand. Firmware with core functionality has been written and a simple front end webpage has been designed. The webpage has a working authentication mechanism which has been verified to work with the hardware.

Essentially the core physical product is ready to go.

Roadmap

- 1-3 months (or less): Project and product release - hardware ready ship with simple clock functionality and authentication capability.  Hire a front-end dev or Plutus pioneer to help finish the "exchange-for physical+NFT" portion of the project.

- 3-6months: Advanced firmware completed and shipped with access control capability, cryptocurrency price ticker, and Cardano epoch slot clock functionality.  Ship instructions for connecting and using a Raspberry PI (instead of the onboard microcontroller) with the NFT Nixie as a Raspberry Pi header.

- 6-12 months: Ideate, design, and release another cool concept with similar proof of authenticity and potentially new features.  Due to the current worldwide chip shortage, these dates might slip further depending on the lead time for required components.

- 12-36 months: : Ideate, design, and release a higher quantity, less niche, product

The funds requested here will be used to support further development and future new project deliveries for the Cardano ecosystem.  In the short term, I will most likely need to hire some kind of front-end dev or Plutus Pioneer to finish the "exchange for physical+NFT" portion of the project. 

Approx. cost for completed proof-of-concept hardware builds (20 units): $12,000.  Cost varies greatly depending on quantity and complexity of hardware, but am happy to be completely transparent on every individual cost item required for future project builds.  Hardware builds can be expensive. If there is a mistake in the design, it costs a lot of money to run another build...unlike software engineering where a code recompile is usually free.

My time: My time is not typically free, but so far this project has been a labor of love for months.  I currently have a full time job at a top Silicon Valley company which can be very demanding of my time - this hobby project must always come second to that since it is what supports me financially.

Connect w/ me

I would like to try to connect with anyone who is interested in bringing this concept to life as well as help further refine this idea into even more products in the future. This could include DEXes, NFT marketplaces, smart contract developers, firmware developers, hardware developers, cryptography experts, or business/marketing folks. 

I am happy to gift one NFT Nixie and associated NFT to a partner which needs the hardware to help with firmware or front-end development.

I would also like to think about releasing the product of this proof-of-concept in a style similar to the UNISOCKS project, which might make it a great showpiece for a new Cardano DEX.  Fungible NIXIE tokens will be burnt in return for the NFT and physical NFT Nixie.

The NFT Nixie will be released no matter what happens with Catalyst.

 More NFT Nixie Literature & Contact Information

Concept Introduction: https://nftnixie.substack.com/p/nft-nixie-technical-deep-dive-part

Technical Deep Dive: https://nftnixie.substack.com/p/intro

Website: https://nftnixie.com

Twitter: @NFTNixie

Email: nftnixie@protonmail.com

Discord: https://discord.gg/xRhuPUz6

References

Total worldwide trade volume: https://www.statista.com/statistics/264682/worldwide-export-volume-in-the-trade-since-1950/

Counterfeit Goods Percentage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfeit_consumer_goods

Unisocks: https://unisocks.exchange/