Tokenised Rights Versus Tokenised Things

There is a distinction we now draw in the first meeting, because everything downstream depends on which side of it a project sits.

A tokenised thing

The token is the asset. Its value derives from scarcity and from what the next buyer will pay. The issuer's obligation ends at the mint. Most 2021 collections were this, whether or not they described themselves that way, and it is why so many are now inert — the issuer's incentive to keep doing anything expired at the point of sale.

A tokenised right

The token is a key. It entitles the holder to something the issuer continues to provide: access, a licence, a share of something, a relationship. Its value derives from what it unlocks, which means the issuer's obligation is ongoing and the token's worth tracks the issuer's continued performance.

This is harder. It is a commitment rather than a transaction. It requires the issuer to still be there in three years, and to have written down what happens if they are not.

Why content owners should almost always be on the second side

Because a media company's asset is not scarcity — it is a relationship with an audience and a catalogue that keeps producing. A token that captures a slice of that relationship has something underneath it. A token that is merely scarce is competing with every other scarce thing, on a dimension where the catalogue confers no advantage at all.

What it demands

Terms that survive transfer. A licence written to travel with the token, in language that means something to a court that has never considered one. Enforcement at the contract layer rather than in a marketplace's policy. And an honest answer to what holders are owed if the programme ends.

That last one is where most projects we review have written nothing at all.