It enables models of funding work that allow you to set the financing terms with less(not necessarily zero) oversight from an enforcing body. The main concepts

It enables models of funding work that allow you to set the financing terms with less(not necessarily zero) oversight from an enforcing body. The main concepts of most NFT markets today are inherited from existing art markets, but done cheaper, with less human involvement. As a speculative instrument, art ownership has always been a bit detached from the physical art, with many works simply sitting in storage while a certificate is traded. Anyone can view a photo of a famous painting - access in a general sense usually is not the issue with the art world, today. Moving it on-chain is just a further move towards centering the finance of it. The net outcome is that you have more artwork being made than before, since there is additional financing opened through this channel, and with more complex terms made possible by using smart contracts. (At large scale, it's hard to engage with royalty payments, etc without automation) From there, the actual utility of the tech can be discussed. Because you can make these cheaply(Ethereum's current gas fees notwithstanding, other L1 chains like Tezos demonstrate that they can be made with truly "micro" payments), you can use them as giveaways, tickets, passes, incentives etc. So they can be multipurposed into something beyond a link to an image and turned into a form of access - they are just "unique identifiers" after all. And those parts are still developing in the background. Of course, we're still working through the hype cycle part of it. And the art makes for a good story.