€2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP • Hacker News Board

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#21

Post by knorker » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:33 AM UTC

> “We can’t just scan it and put it on the internet,” Fang said. But by raising the money as a DAO, Fang said they hoped to show the various estates and stakeholders that there is a massive online interest in making the bible more accessible to the public.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amansethi/spicedao-dune...

I don't know what they're doing, but it seems that they are at least a bit aware that they don't own the rights.

Who exactly are they trying to convince, and about what? I mean they don't just need the rights to the art in the book itself, but they also need to get the movie/TV rights for Dune itself.

Is this really spending €2.6M just to get a foot in the door, to be able to spend, what, another $200M for the actual rights?

But even then, why do they think this DAO is the best way to execute this vision?

They could just go "oh, people are interested in Dune? Ok, let's make a movie, but without involving these DAO people". Oh wait, there already is a Dune series of movies currently being made/in theaters.

But also: The contents have been on the internet for years, apparently: https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNGBuasYa_WETf7sF6Q9W3S... (from the twitter thread)

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#22

Post by stnikolauswagne » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:34 AM UTC

I made the mistake of diving a bit deeper into the group who bought it and found a proposal where they are talking about literally burning the book they just bought after digitizing it for … reasons I guess [0]

At this point I just hope its some sort of practical joke or whatever because this just seems a bit much.

[0] https://forum.spicedao.xyz/t/nft-of-the-book-w-proof-of-jpeg...

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#23

Post by __alexs » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:34 AM UTC

The founders of this DAO are paying themselves >$30,000/month [0] out of the pool to look after an old book and to commission an animated TV series [0] from a company that does music videos and commercials [1].

[0] https://snapshot.org/#/dunedao.eth/proposal/0x2038fc240d0e85... [1] https://robleridgeproductions.com/about/

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#24

Post by Cthulhu_ » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:36 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #6

Who was the seller? Where did the 2.6 million come from? How many other bidders were there? What was the auction model used? How are they going to recover the investment now? And if they won't how will they deal with the write-off? So many questions...

> Where did the 2.6 million come from?

Crypto gains (scammy or otherwise), NFT sales, etc. The phrase 'cryptobros' is used to refer to people who got rich off of crypto shenanigans.

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#25

Post by popilewiz » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:36 AM UTC

xcambar wrote: post #18

jacquesm wrote: post #6

Who was the seller? Where did the 2.6 million come from? How many other bidders were there? What was the auction model used? How are they going to recover the investment now? And if they won't how will they deal with the write-off? So many questions...

Yes, we need answers to these ! I'll add one: why does the thread mention "cryptobros" about buyers when the auction was nothing related to crypto in any way? Is it just becoming a generic insult to dumb people or am I missing something?

No post body was provided.

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#26

Post by stnikolauswagne » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:37 AM UTC

xcambar wrote: post #18

jacquesm wrote: post #6

Who was the seller? Where did the 2.6 million come from? How many other bidders were there? What was the auction model used? How are they going to recover the investment now? And if they won't how will they deal with the write-off? So many questions...

Yes, we need answers to these ! I'll add one: why does the thread mention "cryptobros" about buyers when the auction was nothing related to crypto in any way? Is it just becoming a generic insult to dumb people or am I missing something?

> why does the thread mention "cryptobros" about buyers when the auction was nothing related to crypto in any way?

Because the group who won it crowdfunded the money via cryptocurrency, wants to turn the book into NFTs and is organized in a DAO, if I looked into this a bit more I am sure I would find something about web3 and metaverse and whatever else fits in the bullshit bingo of current discourse around the whole crypto scene. If this does not count as „cryptobros“ then I imagine nothing does.

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#27

Post by carl_dr » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:37 AM UTC

o_m wrote: post #7

jaclaz wrote: post #3

Since it is an auction, besides the winning bidder, there was at least another bidder, which makes two of them and is even more perplexing. It is not really the "Dune" book, but rather its storyboard, more details and a few photos here: https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20211122-doomed-dune-s...

Sounds like a great way to launder money

Spending €2.6M on something worth €26,000? Sounds like a crappy return to me.

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#28

Post by knorker » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:38 AM UTC

xmprt wrote: post #17

2 things confuse me about this. 1. This was a normal auction and not an NFT one. How is a DAO enforced in this case? What happens if the nominated bidder decides to go rogue and bid more or less than the decided cap? What happens if the price of Ethereum drops to the point that the DAO is no longer able to find the 2.6M they need? 2. If this is an auction then there has to be another bidder (I doubt even the people i…

According to the buzzfeed article it was bought by one guy, and then the DAO community appears to reimburse him.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amansethi/spicedao-dune...

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#29

Post by libertine » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:39 AM UTC

rhn_mk1 wrote: post #11

I think I'm beginning to understand the prices of art NFTs: the majory of people simply don't understand that NFTs aren't representing much anything of value. It's even harder to believe that the box is empty when its price was so high.

I came here to comment something in the likes of this, just to add it helps to understand not only the price of art NFTs but the dynamics of it.

These "investments" are all backed up by some fantasy that works in their "realm" - like buying an avatar that will be used in "the metaverse", being the metaverse a collective fantasy and illusion.

Just like these fellows are so emotionally invested in this fantasy that they were already selling the rights of a TV Show to a streaming service... and I bet that if you go to them now they have the narrative that this will be sold to some yet to exist streaming service of the metaverse based on NFTs.

Re: €2.6M spent for a book at auction, believed they would own the IP

#30

Post by camjw » Mon, Jan 17, 2022, 10:39 AM UTC

My favorite part of this story is that they DAO has actually raised ~$8m, spent $3m on the book (10x the expected auction price), then the "core team" has started paying themselves ~$30k a month[0]. Also, how is this "decentralised" when one person owns over 50% of the voting token?

[0] https://snapshot.org/#/dunedao.eth/proposal/0x2038fc240d0e85...