The Crypto Games

Day 13: The latest tech fad has come to the Olympics

Feb 16, 2022

Cryptocurrency and its cousin NFTs are everywhere these days. Popular platform Coinbase debuted on the NASDAQ with the 7th biggest IPO ever, the LA Lakers famed Staples Center recently became Crypto.com Arena in a $700 Million naming deal, and of course the Super Bowl was awash in crypto ads. The Olympics is the obvious next step.

U.S. Figure Skating, the sports governing body here, began accepting cryptocurrency donations this month, and The British Olympic Association recently launched the Gold Lion Club NFT for fans. Cryptocurrency and the Olympics even have a history already. In 2014 the Jamaican Bobsled Team qualified for the Sochi Games but didn’t have the funding to attend. In stepped the internet, and helped raise 27 million Dogecoin to send the team to Russia.

So why wouldn’t the definitely-not-corrupt-at-all International Olympic Committee want to get a piece of the action?

The IOC has partnered with NFT platform nWay to create a series of Officially Licensed Olympic Games NFTs based on pins and posters. You can digitally own this adorable Bing Dwen Dwen CURLING! pin for only $880:

An officially licensed Olympics NFT of Beijing 2022 mascot Bing Dwen Dwen.

The official NFTs also have a tie-in mobile game where you can compete in Olympics mini-games to win NFTs that you can then sell in the real world. Sounds complicated.

If you’re looking for something decidedly less IOC-endorsed, dissident Chinese artist Badiucao has created a series of poster art NFTs. Each of the five designs cleverly juxtaposes Winter Olympics sports with critiques of China’s occupation of Tibet, the Uyghur genocide, the end of democracy in Hong Kong, the surveillance state, and the COVID-19 pandemic.