Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

seths.blog

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

471–480 of 786 posts

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#471

Post by leppr »

satyrnein wrote: post #428
leppr wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point. In most modern cities, the only individualistic solution to escape eternal rent-slavery (forgive the strong word) is to become rich. A collectivist solution would be to coordinate with other citizens to abolish the building/zoning restrictions and savings devaluation enforced by local and national governments, that cause the constant real estate price inflation in the first place.

Unfortunately, the "other citizens" are the ones who want the zoning restrictions.

Since most governance schemes favor entrenched players, there's a natural tendency for policies resulting in pyramid schemes to emerge.

The first step is to educate enough people around this issue, so that some opportunistic countries/cities can become competitive at attracting residents using fairer policies as a differentiator.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#472

Post by meowface »

dools wrote: post #312
tshaddox wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But with something like CryptoPunks you're essentially paying for digital beanie babies, which are worse than real ones since anyone can display and enjoy the image you paid for. It seems like the obvious counterpoint is that perhaps all of these “collectible” scarce physical things which are bought and sold for huge amounts of money (art, coins, relics, etc.) are in fact being used simply as a way to identify a un…

Also if anything is a digital beanie baby then so is Bitcoin, what’s the difference?

You're not wrong, but there can be more than one thing playing such a role. Bitcoin is Beanie Babies, Ethereum is a varied ecosystem of pet rocks, Monero is Pokemon cards with traces of white powder. Can't hurt to diversify your speculation.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#473

Post by bradleyjg »

jamesgreenleaf wrote: post #37

NFTs make perfect sense for representing a claim on things that can be used, like event tickets or in-game virtual goods. But as certificates layered on top of collectibles... I'm not so sure. With something like CryptoKitties, you can do something with the tokens (play a virtual pet game). But with something like CryptoPunks you're essentially paying for digital beanie babies, which are worse than real ones since an…

This has value because it’s a tangible reductio ad absurdum for crypto currencies. Best case art, median case scam.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#475

Post by marshmallow_12 »

marshmallow_12 wrote: post #329
pmlnr wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teaching people that being "rich" is not a goal would help in the progress. The goal is enough: a point when one still yearns, so they can progress, but they don't suffer or live in fear for losing warmth, shelter, food, etc. But this idea seems far from the majority of the US mindset, and it's polluting many parts of the world as well.

The voice of reason right until the end. The world has problems. Lets blame the US. Even if you are right, it will help nobody to say so.

not that i don't think your points aren't good just that finger-pointing is a bit destructive.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#476

Post by TheColorYellow »

wokwokwok wrote: post #429
TheColorYellow wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rephrasing your questions and critiques more broadly: What is the point of all this digital infrastructure if no one uses it? Why would anyone use it? This is a more difficult question for NFTs as the market is even smaller than the financial use cases which has been driving blockchain applications. It'll take some time for seemingly legitimate and long-lasting value in areas for NFT to emerge as they are still being…

> the NFT will be taken as the source of truth for representing the ownership of the claimed asset... I simply can’t see how that is possible for digital assets you can copy and paste and have two copies of the original asset; it only works for physical assets where there can only be one copy of the asset, ever. You’ve hit it on the head: what does it mean to own an image when ten other people also “own” a copy of it…

> unless you assert ownership entitles you to additional legal rights beyond what the token convey

This is precisely the idea to a certain extent. The ledger serves as proof of ownership which then allows access to entitlements dictated by that ownership. This being done in a digital first way is another aspect as well (although not really conceptually mind blowing to me personally).

> how the hell is that different from the same thing with no crypto involved?

This goes back to what I said earlier about the characteristics of the underlying network driving the value. The differences can be in things like the peer-to-peer nature or the decentralized infrastructure which provides a degree of censorship resistance or improved accessibility.

We're at the point where credible evidence of the value added by these characteristics is still being explored. You can certainly make some level of argument as to why the decentralized nature of these protocols is better than the traditional alternative, but even I'll admit its difficult to parse through the noise of speculation and hype for the arguments that may be worth a damn.

The idea of distributing control, responsibility, costs, and other aspects of operating a system away from singular points of failure is an idea that seems worth investigating and to me this is what blockchain is doing. NFTs are a different flavor of exploration then that of cryptocurrencies.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#477

Post by jerry1979 »

samim wrote: post #295

NFT's are Bullshit: https://samim.io/p/2021-03-05-non-fungible-tokens-nft-are-bu... In Summary: 1. The NFT doubles down on the worst of copyright, the property metaphor, & tries to impose old ideas of scarcity & exclusion on the digital realm, where both are obsolete. 2.NFTs are an absolute ecological disaster

I don't use NFTs, but the author of the linked blog article said Proof of Stake avoids the ecological problem.

That author also does not engage meaningfully with the green energy side of the crypto ecosystem. Strong international and local regulations would go a long way in protecting the environment and local prices.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#478

Post by danfritz »

Don't forget that this is just a social construct. Without anything tangeable (physical) we just have to agree that a NFT is unique / original.

Compare it with paper notes, they are worthless but sociaty gives it value. If we all agree paper notes are worthless it is worthless.

I can see easily how this becomes worthless in a couple of years when the bubble bursts and the hype is over

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#479

Post by electriclove »

So much FUD. If the author tokenizes their blog posts they may come to find out they cannot sell them for much whereas Jack's first tweet tokenized is definitely worth something to people.

Digital collectibles can be transacted much more easily that trying to sell your old baseball cards (store, list, ship, etc).

ETH is moving to PoS and FLOW (which is used for NBA Top Shots) uses PoS. The energy complaint is short sighted.

Check out eulerbeats.com for a model that allows owners of originals to generate income and owners of prints to easy recoup 90% of their cost (all built into the smart contract).

If I could buy an NFT of my favorite YouTuber's piano video, I would do it in a heartbeat. It would support them directly and allow me as a fan to 'own' something valuable to me (proof of that support).

Yes, there will be many who lose money and like anything else, we build up a lot of hype for something new, but it is early days and there is so much potential.

Re: NFTs Are a Dangerous Trap

#480

Post by TheColorYellow »

qqii wrote: post #450
samim wrote: post #295

NFT's are Bullshit: https://samim.io/p/2021-03-05-non-fungible-tokens-nft-are-bu... In Summary: 1. The NFT doubles down on the worst of copyright, the property metaphor, & tries to impose old ideas of scarcity & exclusion on the digital realm, where both are obsolete. 2.NFTs are an absolute ecological disaster

The unique expression of ownership is novel, it really depends on how they're legally interpreted to conclude if they're bad. If you interpret them literally they're a better form of copyright that what currently exists. It accepts that digital recreations are easy and doesn't seek to prevent them yet still provides scarcity and reward for the effort in producing it. The NFT of Jack Dorsey's tweet is interpreted to c…

> It accepts that digital recreations are easy and doesn't seek to prevent them yet still provides scarcity and reward for the effort in producing it.

I like this description quite a bit. Im obviously a believer already, but this is a good way to describe the value potential of blockchain based NFTs.

Slight digression, but personally I hate the way scarcity always makes its way into the conversation due to the obsessive discussion of deflation, but I think in the case of NFTs it fits well.

I'd rephrase your statement as saying that NFTs using blockchain protocols preserve the scarcity of owning an asset. Then extending that, digitally verifiable proof of the scarce resource (i.e. ownership) is the aspect that can create an economic incentive for ownership.

Well said!

Post reply on HN