Research paper

Designing a fair and inclusive digital asset-based name-image-likeness marketplace

Motivated by fairness and inclusiveness in student-athlete NIL monetization, the paper defines design requirements and three design principles - randomized royalty-paying collectible sales (inclusiveness), market-driven royalties (meritocracy), and blockchain as marketplace infrastructure - realized via NFTs and smart contracts.

Paper

Overview

Publication metadata and narrative from the current library record.

Authors: Arthur Carvalho, Liudmila Zavolokina, Suman Bhunia, Gerhard Schwabe
Year: 2026
Venue: Decision Support Systems 201 (2026) 114580
Methodology: Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.
DOI: 10.1016/j.dss.2025.114580
Design knowledge: View design knowledge on GitHub

blockchaindesign-science-researchfairnessmarketplacenftnil-marketplace-fair-inclusivesports

Summary

Artifact

A blockchain/NFT-based name-image-likeness (NIL) marketplace for student-athletes.

Methodology

Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.

DSR grid

Six dimensions represented in the current paper record.

Problem description

Only a fraction of student-athletes profit from their name, image and likeness (NIL), raising fairness and inclusiveness concerns when sharing a limited amount of financial resources.

Input knowledge

Fair division and distributive justice (including Aristotle's maxim); Roth's market-design theory; the possibility effect; the authors' inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; NFTs and smart contracts.

Research process

Design science research: interviews with student-athletes, derivation of requirements, principles and features, and demonstration and evaluation.

Key concepts

Blockchain, design science, fairness, inclusiveness, NIL, NFT.

Solution description

An NFT-based NIL marketplace with randomized, royalty-paying primary sales and market-driven secondary-market royalties. Solution-space representation: Instantiation plus design theory (requirements, principles and features).

Output knowledge

Five design requirements, three design principles and two design features satisfying inclusive-meritocratic fairness.

Paper design map

The default semantic design map canonicalizes stored design relationships; Raw links retains the complete technical Markdown-link view.

Design-knowledge map

10 stored concepts / 8 canonical semantic relationships

Concept types

Show relationship labels

Design knowledge

Directly linked concepts, grouped by their represented design-knowledge category.

2 Design Features

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-df1

DF1 - Primary Markets

Purchasing collectibles mints NFTs, and on monetary compensation a predetermined, hardcoded portion of the value is distributed as royalties among the associated student-athletes (randomized primary-market sales).

design-featurefairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-df2

DF2 - Market Exchanges

Minted NFTs that pay royalties to student-athletes can be traded in secondary markets;

design-featurefairnessmarketplacenft+2

3 Design Principles

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dp1

DP1 - Plausible events (randomized collectible sales)

Enable market-based randomized sales of royalty-paying collectibles so that every student-athlete has a non-zero chance of profiting from their NIL, satisfying the inclusiveness requirement via the possibility effect.

design-principlefairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dp2

DP2 - Market royalties (meritocratic allocation)

Allow ex-post, market-driven adjustments to the initial allocation through royalties from secondary-market sales of collectibles, so that student-athletes are rewarded in proportion to relevant differences, satisfying meritocratic fairness.

design-principlefairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dp3

DP3 - Blockchain-based marketplace infrastructure

Use blockchain technology as the foundational infrastructure - with transparent public ledgers and smart contracts - to create a well-functioning NIL collectibles marketplace that satisfies requirements for successful markets.

design-principlefairnessmarketplacenft+2

5 Design Requirements

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr1

DR1 - Inclusiveness

NIL projects should provide all student-athletes with access to opportunities and resources.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr2

DR2 - Meritocratic Allocation

Relevant differences among student-athletes should be a driving factor when allocating NIL financial resources.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr3

DR3 - Market Thickness

Participants in market-based NIL projects should be able to find trading partners quickly.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr4

DR4 - No Congestion

Market-based NIL projects must overcome congestion by having fast transactions.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr5

DR5 - Market Safety

Market-based NIL initiatives must be safe for the student-athletes.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

Publication metadata

Additional metadata represented in the current library record.

Show additional metadata

{
  "type": "paper",
  "title": "Designing a fair and inclusive digital asset-based name-image-likeness marketplace",
  "description": "Motivated by fairness and inclusiveness in student-athlete NIL monetization, the paper defines design requirements and three design principles - randomized royalty-paying collectible sales (inclusiveness), market-driven royalties (meritocracy), and blockchain as marketplace infrastructure - realized via NFTs and smart contracts.",
  "resource": "https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dss.2025.114580",
  "authors": "Arthur Carvalho, Liudmila Zavolokina, Suman Bhunia, Gerhard Schwabe",
  "year": 2026,
  "venue": "Decision Support Systems 201 (2026) 114580",
  "methodology": "Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.",
  "dsr_grid": true,
  "dsr_solution_space": "Instantiation plus design theory (requirements, principles and features).",
  "tags": [
    "nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive",
    "marketplace",
    "fairness",
    "nft",
    "sports",
    "design-science-research",
    "blockchain"
  ]
}

Research paper

Designing a fair and inclusive digital asset-based name-image-likeness marketplace

Paper

Overview

Publication metadata and narrative from the current library record.

Authors: Arthur Carvalho, Liudmila Zavolokina, Suman Bhunia, Gerhard Schwabe
Year: 2026
Venue: Decision Support Systems 201 (2026) 114580
Methodology: Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.
DOI: 10.1016/j.dss.2025.114580
Design knowledge: View design knowledge on GitHub

blockchaindesign-science-researchfairnessmarketplacenftnil-marketplace-fair-inclusivesports

Summary

Artifact

A blockchain/NFT-based name-image-likeness (NIL) marketplace for student-athletes.

Methodology

Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.

DSR grid

Six dimensions represented in the current paper record.

Problem description

Only a fraction of student-athletes profit from their name, image and likeness (NIL), raising fairness and inclusiveness concerns when sharing a limited amount of financial resources.

Input knowledge

Research process

Design science research: interviews with student-athletes, derivation of requirements, principles and features, and demonstration and evaluation.

Key concepts

Blockchain, design science, fairness, inclusiveness, NIL, NFT.

Solution description

Output knowledge

Five design requirements, three design principles and two design features satisfying inclusive-meritocratic fairness.

Paper design map

The default semantic design map canonicalizes stored design relationships; Raw links retains the complete technical Markdown-link view.

Design-knowledge map

10 stored concepts / 8 canonical semantic relationships

Concept types

Show relationship labels

Design knowledge

Directly linked concepts, grouped by their represented design-knowledge category.

2 Design Features

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-df1

DF1 - Primary Markets

design-featurefairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-df2

DF2 - Market Exchanges

Minted NFTs that pay royalties to student-athletes can be traded in secondary markets;

design-featurefairnessmarketplacenft+2

3 Design Principles

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dp1

5 Design Requirements

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr1

DR1 - Inclusiveness

NIL projects should provide all student-athletes with access to opportunities and resources.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr2

DR2 - Meritocratic Allocation

Relevant differences among student-athletes should be a driving factor when allocating NIL financial resources.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr3

DR3 - Market Thickness

Participants in market-based NIL projects should be able to find trading partners quickly.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr4

DR4 - No Congestion

Market-based NIL projects must overcome congestion by having fast transactions.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

design-knowledge/nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive-dr5

DR5 - Market Safety

Market-based NIL initiatives must be safe for the student-athletes.

design-requirementfairnessmarketplacenft+2

Publication metadata

Additional metadata represented in the current library record.

Show additional metadata

{
  "type": "paper",
  "title": "Designing a fair and inclusive digital asset-based name-image-likeness marketplace",
  "description": "Motivated by fairness and inclusiveness in student-athlete NIL monetization, the paper defines design requirements and three design principles - randomized royalty-paying collectible sales (inclusiveness), market-driven royalties (meritocracy), and blockchain as marketplace infrastructure - realized via NFTs and smart contracts.",
  "resource": "https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dss.2025.114580",
  "authors": "Arthur Carvalho, Liudmila Zavolokina, Suman Bhunia, Gerhard Schwabe",
  "year": 2026,
  "venue": "Decision Support Systems 201 (2026) 114580",
  "methodology": "Design science research; interviews with student-athletes; the inclusive-meritocratic fairness criterion; design features and evaluation.",
  "dsr_grid": true,
  "dsr_solution_space": "Instantiation plus design theory (requirements, principles and features).",
  "tags": [
    "nil-marketplace-fair-inclusive",
    "marketplace",
    "fairness",
    "nft",
    "sports",
    "design-science-research",
    "blockchain"
  ]
}