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NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

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Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#71

Post by danShumway »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #43
stickfigure wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scarcity is necessary but not sufficient. What sets BTC apart from NTFs is its fungibility. In theory, there are an infinite number of potential cryptocurrencies, sure. But everyone has already embraced bitcoin (and a small handful of others), and replacing that userbase is an incredibly tall hurdle. On the other hand, minting a new beanie-baby-NFT takes less effort than making an actual beanie baby.

I think you're missing the purpose of NFTs. Again, I think the best analogy is really the art market. Most art in the art market is pretty worthless (at least monetarily) - just go to one of a bajillion garage sales to see why. But a few pieces of art will be worth a lot because something about them is desirable. It's the same with NFTs. There will be a bajillion "beanie-baby-NFTs" that will be close to worthless. An…

> And then there will be a few of the "Charlie Bit My Finger" variety that people actually have desire to uniquely "own".

Not necessarily. The original creator that issued that "Charlie Bit My Finger" NFT could also create 1,000 more of them tomorrow. And all of those NFTs would be exactly as valid as the original, it wouldn't be equivalent to making a print of the Mona Lisa. It wouldn't be downstream of the original NFT, the original NFT is just a link to a publicly hosted asset.

You're trusting the creator that they won't do that, but you have no real guarantee that they won't. That's doubly true when you start looking at corporate-backed NFTs like what the NBA is doing. They control the entire supply of the NFTs they issue, you have no way to guarantee that they won't re-issue all of their NFTs that you own.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#72

Post by analog31 »

rices wrote: post #65

For me nfts provide an easier way for me to support digital artists I love that I've been following for a while. I don't really like the collectable scarcity kind of thing, but I like building a collection and having an easy way to explore and find art and artists. Also a lot of these websites are providing this art at higher resolutions and quality than social media would allow for (IPFS) and without direct hosting.…

Indeed, and I'm much less skeptical, if it's seen as akin to buying tickets to a concert. The value is in enjoying the music in the present moment, and knowing that the musicians are receiving some income. A concert ticket is an NFT of sorts. Nobody will ever be able to attend that concert again.

I own plenty of concert tickets.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#73

Post by stickfigure »

ohdannyboy wrote: post #37
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This would have been more interesting if the author had traced where all the money being plowed into NFTs is coming from. Not possible to trace where the money is coming from. In fact, someone can "sell" an NFT to themself in a wash trade between two wallets they control. The last trade price of the NFT is now recorded as the transaction price, but it's possible that money never actually changed hands. Want to have…

Can't you do that at normal auctions using (for lack of a better word) a shill bidder?

Yes, but the auction house takes a cut and the taxman might notice so it's not without risk. Usually a shill bidder doesn't want to win the actual bid.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#74

Post by PragmaticPulp »

ohdannyboy wrote: post #37
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This would have been more interesting if the author had traced where all the money being plowed into NFTs is coming from. Not possible to trace where the money is coming from. In fact, someone can "sell" an NFT to themself in a wash trade between two wallets they control. The last trade price of the NFT is now recorded as the transaction price, but it's possible that money never actually changed hands. Want to have…

Can't you do that at normal auctions using (for lack of a better word) a shill bidder?

You could, and it likely happens in some cases.

However, an auction house is going to take significant fees as a percentage of the sale price and your shill bidder will want a cut as well. You’re also going to get a large tax bill because you technically had a realized capital gain and the auction house will report it.

With NFTs you can do a blockchain transaction for a relatively small fee by yourself from your computer. No taxes owed because you didn’t actually sell anything.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#75

Post by smt88 »

omarfarooq wrote: post #4
stickfigure wrote: post #2

> The venn diagram of NFT haters are almost exact matches of Crypto haters Nonsense. I'm pro-crypto but think NFTs are absolutely idiotic. Scarcity is fundamental to any store of value. There are an infinite number of potential NFTs.

> There are an infinite number of potential NFTs. That doesn't mean there is an infinite number of any given collection.

> That doesn't mean there is an infinite number of any given collection.

For digital collections, there are an infinite number. The only finite thing, in this case, is the NFT.

NFTs are not digital representations of art. They don't create scarcity. They're digital trading cards: their scarcity is only relevant and verifiable in and of themselves.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#76

Post by danShumway »

baby wrote: post #59
danShumway wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a big overlap -- if you're a crypto skeptic, you are almost certainly going to be an NFT skeptic as well. But the reverse is not necessarily true. NFTs are just fundamentally a lot worse than cryptocurrencies. They have every problem that cryptocurrencies have, except they're also not scarce, require centralized verification mechanisms, have bad incentive structures around hoarding, are prone to link…

It doesn’t make sense to say that an NFT is not scarce. Every NFT is unique by design.

Most NFTs are just links to a publicly hosted asset. They're not meaningfully unique in any of the ways that matter.

Sure, technically you're making a new NFT when the same creator mints an NFT that points to the same work as before. But also technically you're making a new dollar with a new serial label when the government prints money, and we don't call paper money "non-fungible". It's not a kind of uniqueness that matters to anyone.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#77

Post by 2muchcoffeeman »

seibelj wrote: post #18

Why do people want Picassos? Show them off, appear sophisticated, an investment, etc. Crypto Punks are something a wealthy segment of society likes and because they are graphical and fit neatly into an avatar, they become like an expensive watch except for the digital set. This phenomenon is not hard to understand.

A Picasso actually has cultural and historical significance. And we probably had to think about it hard after the work was done. And collections even of the super rich are not necessarily random pieces. They may have hired a curator.

An NFT can be some shitty gif hardly worth mentioning let alone displaying.

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#78

Post by spoonjim »

Godel_unicode wrote: post #68
spoonjim wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I actually think that scarcity is the only thing that NFTs have. I almost think of them as the purest distillation of scarcity. Everyone knows you can get a perfect copy of a Vermeer done for $10k. Why is the real Vermeer worth more? Because the guy with the real Vermeer knows that while you can have the lighting and you can have the shadows, you can’t have the scarcity. And the concept of an NFT is just…

Right, because the creator of the NFT totally can't just mint another token right after you buy the first one. Oh wait, just kidding they can. And there's absolutely nothing you can do, because you don't _actually_ own the thing, you just own a trivially replicated pointer to the thing. It's ok though, because at least the original will definitely be the one to be valuable, and not the 42nd, 69th, or 420th. Right? Ri…

But that’s exactly what the scarcity value of a Vermeer is (which is 99% of the value). People can make infinite numbers of copies. NFTs just kind of lay that bare. It’s almost like the concept itself a performance art. “Can we cleave off the scarcity from the art/history/je ne sais quoi that fuels the hoarding of other scarce artifacts, and just sell that disembodied scarcity in a marketplace?”

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#79

Post by stickfigure »

analog31 wrote: post #72
rices wrote: post #65

For me nfts provide an easier way for me to support digital artists I love that I've been following for a while. I don't really like the collectable scarcity kind of thing, but I like building a collection and having an easy way to explore and find art and artists. Also a lot of these websites are providing this art at higher resolutions and quality than social media would allow for (IPFS) and without direct hosting.…

Indeed, and I'm much less skeptical, if it's seen as akin to buying tickets to a concert. The value is in enjoying the music in the present moment, and knowing that the musicians are receiving some income. A concert ticket is an NFT of sorts. Nobody will ever be able to attend that concert again. I own plenty of concert tickets.

Did you buy the ticket and skip the concert? How did you feel about paying 30% to ticketmaster?

Re: NFT projects are just MLMs for tech elites

#80

Post by doublerebel »

danShumway wrote: post #71
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're missing the purpose of NFTs. Again, I think the best analogy is really the art market. Most art in the art market is pretty worthless (at least monetarily) - just go to one of a bajillion garage sales to see why. But a few pieces of art will be worth a lot because something about them is desirable. It's the same with NFTs. There will be a bajillion "beanie-baby-NFTs" that will be close to worthless. An…

> And then there will be a few of the "Charlie Bit My Finger" variety that people actually have desire to uniquely "own". Not necessarily. The original creator that issued that "Charlie Bit My Finger" NFT could also create 1,000 more of them tomorrow. And all of those NFTs would be exactly as valid as the original, it wouldn't be equivalent to making a print of the Mona Lisa. It wouldn't be downstream of the original…

This is no different than any current artist with a limited print run. The earliest prints are typically still the most valuable and the artist has incentive not to create additional runs of the same artwork.
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