Since blockchain became popular, one use case has stuck with it - tokenization. I believe you, reading this, are aware that almost anything can be tokenized on the blockchain. With tokenization comes every possibility to monetize.

Now you can see why crypto maxis are crazy about the concept of tokenization.

SocialFi, GameFi, MusicFi.

These concepts all have one thing in common. The very obvious suffix “Fi” behind the main terms, gotten from DeFi or Finance, if you may. Blockchain has made it possible to be able to tokenize social media profiles, in-game items, songs as they relate to the above concepts respectively.

Stick with me as we explore these concepts, what they mean, pros and cons, some projects building on each of them.

SocialFi:

Based on a research by Datareportal published earlier this year, more than half of the world’s population use social media. While average daily usage of social media globally is 2 hours 24 minutes. For most people, it’s even more.

All the time spent on social media and you’re not getting rewarded for it. Even worse, your data and contents are controlled by some entities that don’t care about you. To top it all, your account(s) could be suspended or banned for no reasonable cause.

But what if you can earn money for those likes, engagements? What if you could monetize your profile? What if you could get control of your data and contents? So many what ifs, right?

With blockchain, there are no limits to what can be done and SocialFi is another concept brought to life by this tech.

SocialFi (Social + Finance) is the term conceptualized from the principles of integrating decentralization, tokenization and monetization into social media platforms. SocialFi platforms aim to allow users’ profiles to be tokenized and tradeable, enabling users to interact with each other whilst monetizing their interactions.

SocialFi is often regarded as the evolution of social media platforms but to drive adoption of these SocialFi platforms, there is still a high dependence on the current social media platforms. SocialFi aims to allow creators to get the most of their time and the value they create by rewarding them.

Some SocialFi Projects

Friend.Tech

Friend.tech is a “decentralized” social media platform where users can tokenize their profiles and trade them as keys (formerly called shares). The platform launched in August 2023 on Base layer 2 blockchain and requires users to connect their X (formerly called Twitter) accounts to be able to tokenize and monetize them. There is still reliance on X, which is a centralized platform, hence the reason why decentralized is closed in quote.

The popular social media network did get its own share of attention at the first week(s) of launch but now, the hype has died down. Friend.tech is still very much active despite the suspicions surrounding the true intention of the platform. As at November 21st, the platform has $30.51 million worth of tokens in TVL.

There’s no doubt that the term “SocialFi” became popular with the launch of Friend.tech but there are projects already building on this concept even before Friend tech went live.

Loozr

Loozr is a decentralized music streaming and SocialFi platform launched in 2022. It is a platform where artistes and content creators can tokenize their songs and contents respectively and also their profiles. Fans can then trade their favorite artistes and creators’ $PROFILE tokens, hence, sharing in their success. It is built on NEAR blockchain and mainnet is set to launch next month.

Stars Arena

This is another SocialFi platform that went viral after it lost $3M of users’ funds due to a smart contract exploit in October. This came less than two weeks after the platform launched in September. This project, built on the Avalanche blockchain, was launched just a few weeks after Friend.tech launched and has seen a lot of setbacks after the hack. More suspicions arose when the CEO stepped down and another core team member left the project a day after that. Currently, the platform has $436,513 in TVL.

BitClout

This list won’t be complete without mentioning BitClout. BitClout is a blockchain-based social media platform launched in 2021, though it had been in development since 2019 before public launch. Users can trade creator coins which are tokenized profiles of content creators and perform many other activities that are incentivized.

Other SocialFi projects are:

Phaver
Lens Protocol
CyberConnect
Gari Network (Chingari)

GameFi:

GameFi (a portmanteau of game and finance) is a concept derived from the fusion of blockchain tech, video games and finance (DeFi). Projects building on this concept develop games that allow gamers to earn for doing what they enjoy most - playing games and completing tasks. These rewards can come in form of in-game items, tradeable fungible or non-fungible tokens (Play-to-Earn, #P2E). The term “GameFi” became popular in 2020 but some blockchain games had already been developed before then.

Some GameFi Projects

Axie Infinity
The Sandbox
Guild of Guardians
DeRace
Mobox
Gods Unchained
Illuvium
Organya
Mazuri
XLand

MusicFi:

MusicFi is a concept, obviously derived from music and finance (DeFi). This is the fusion of music into blockchain, thereby allowing artistes to be able to create and tokenize their songs on the blockchain, allowing fans to stream and trade these tokenized songs. MusicFi introduces the idea of #Listen2Earn because users can earn for streaming their favs’ songs unlike the norm in traditional music streaming platforms.

MusicFi benefits artistes and fans in a number of ways.

For artistes;

Improved royalty payout from decentralized music streaming platforms than traditional streaming platforms can dare to pay.
Better monetization of songs.
Great reduction in the issue of copyright infringement as songs tokenized on the blockchain are permanently stored and owners’ info recorded.

For fans;

Earn for streaming songs (this is not possible on traditional streaming platforms).
Earn for trading tokenized songs.

Some MusicFi Projects

Bitsong, launched in 2018
Audius
Loozr
Grooveup
Soundxyz
Pianity
Opulous
Song tech, launched recently
Gala Music

SportFi:

SportFi is a new concept which integrates blockchain tech in sports. Chiliz (the leading web3 infrastructure for the sports and entertainment industry) recently launched its Chain ecosystem to unify projects in the SportFi ecosystem. This company, no doubt, has popularized the idea of SportFi.

Chiliz is the creator of the popular Fan tokens, which are official digital tokens that represent soccer/football teams like Arsenal, Juventus, FC Barcelona, Manchester City and more.

Some SportFi Projects

Scouterz: a SocialFi community platform for athletes and sports fans. FriendTech but for sports. Fans can scout new talents and be rewarded for it; while athletes can engage with their fans and be rewarded.
Lillius: an AI sports challenge platform that rewards participation.
Sport Fusion: a decentralized sports prediction marketplace for lovers of sports.
Swiper Social: an entertainment social platform for sport fans to play and enjoy games and do much more.

EduFi:

If only one could earn money for sitting through those long, boring chemistry lectures, our chemistry lecturers wouldn’t have complained so much about poor attendance. But then again, who would want to pay you to learn? I mean, learning is supposed to be for your own good right?

Well, welcome to blockchain where everything has the potential to be profitable, even learning. Does the term “Learn2Earn” ring a bell? Well, it should. It is the basis on which EduFi lies.

EduFi is a combination of “Education” and “Finance.” This is a concept birthed to incentivize learning. Binance is said to be the pioneer of EduFi when it integrated the learn-to-earn feature in Binance Academy in 2022, although Binance Academy itself went live in 2018. Binance Academy is a platform where people visit to learn more about blockchain technology and since 2022, get rewarded in crypto for doing so. EduFi projects are basically those learn-to-earn programs that have become so popular today.

Some EduFi (Learn-to-Earn) Programs

Bake (formerly called Cake DeFi) Learn and Earn Program
CoinMarketcap Learn and Earn
Coinbase Learn and Earn Program
CoinGecko Earn
Robinhood Learn and Earn

MovieFi

At this point you’d probably think I’m making this up, but that's not the case. You can now earn for watching movies :) I mean why sit long hours watching horror movies, screaming, getting scared and not be rewarded for it?

Blockchain is making it possible to incentivize consumption of films.

Some MovieFi Projects

Gala Films: this is a decentralized platform where users are rewarded with the native token ($FILM) for watching and supporting films - Watch and Earn. While creators are incentivized for bringing films to the platform based on the viewership of that content.

Gala Film is creating an ecosystem where filmmakers, producers, directors and audience can interact seamlessly, thereby creating an efficient way for cinematic content to be funded, produced and distributed. Users purchase film NFTs and once the film has been released, holders will be able to watch the entire movie on the Gala Film platform.

Phew…it’s been one hell of a ride going through the Fi’s :)

Is there anyone I missed? I’d love to hear from you.

Meanwhile, I’ll be patiently waiting for FoodFi projects, where I can get rewarded for eating. Haha :)