OpenSea’s new protocol Seaport, how to reshape the NFT trading market

On May 21, NFT marketplace OpenSea announced the launch of a new Web3 marketplace protocol, Seaport Protocol, for the safe and efficient buying and selling of NFTs. This article covers exactly what it means and how it can fundamentally change the way we buy/sell/transact NFTs.

Uniswap changed the game with open source decentralized exchanges as part of what we now know as Avalanche at DeFi Summer 2020. This move by OpenSea could have the same potential.

DeFi Pulse

Uniswap is an open-source platform and multiple imitators of different chains have emerged (Sushiswap, Pancakeswap), which has led to massive growth and innovation in DEX and DeFi. This move by OpenSea’s Web3 marketplace protocol sends a signal to the competition: “Bring it on., and let the best marketplace wins.”

What is the Seaport Agreement?

Seaport core smart contracts are open source and inherently decentralized, with no contract owner, upgradeability, and other features. Now, OpenSea is a marketplace platform (similar to Facebook). The platform provides services that allow you to buy and sell NFTs.

OpenSea Corporation controls 100% of the platform, so any changes to the code (such as accepting APEs) are owned (centralized) by OpenSea.

In contracts, protocols are similar to “standards”. What we are all familiar with is that email uses the SMTP protocol(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol).An SMTP email server will have an address (or addresses) that can be set by the mail client or application that you are using and is generally formatted as smtp.serveraddress.com. For example, the SMTP server Gmail uses is smtp.gmail.com, and Twilio SendGrid’s is smtp.sendgrid.com.

One of the great things you can do with a protocol is “transfer” your account, or interoperability. If you don’t like using Yahoo because you think their layout is too ugly, or you get too much spam every day, you can transfer your account to Gmail and use their client instead.

OpenSea is improving the decentralized buy/sell/trading of NFTs by launching the Seaport protocol.

6 key points of the Seaport protocol and what it means for the NFT world?

1. Open source code: With the Seaport protocol, anyone can use the protocol to build an NFT marketplace because it is decentralized and open source. Over the next few years, we should see more NFT marketplaces build up.
2. Decentralized: OpenSea says this protocol has no contract owner and anyone can update or generate code. To understand what this means for the future of the NFT market, please refer to the ERC-721 token standard. Everyone can use it to issue their NFTs.
3. Buy or trade: Currently, you can only buy or sell ETH or NFT (APE, USDC, DAI). Unlike some platforms that can only exchange cryptocurrencies for NFTs, the Seaport protocol allows users to acquire NFTs in a range of new ways, where bidders (or bidders) can bundle different assets (such as offering ETH/ERC20/ERC721/ERC1155 assets) in exchange for NFTs. For example, suppose a user owns a 40 ETH Doodle NFT, but wants to trade a 100 ETH BAYC NFT, the user can bid with the owned Doodle NFT and 60 ETH.
4. Transaction specific NFTs: When trading an NFT, you can also set specific “conditions” that the NFT must have.
5. Dutch auction listings：Not sure what the market value of your NFT is? you can creat a Dutch auction first. In the Seaport protocol, you can set a start and end price, indicating how long you want the auction to last. The listing will lower (or raise) the price until a buyer is found (or auction time is up).
6. Find bugs and earn money: OpenSea is running a two-week protocol audit competition with a total prize pool of $1 million. Any developer can review the code, submit reviews and bugs they find, and will be rewarded.

Summarize: The market outlook will be very different in the months and years to come. Many whales will choose to build on the Seaport protocol, which will increasingly become the standard for NFTs.