Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

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steve321
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Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by steve321 »

I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by gwe67 »

I'm planning on buying the exact number of those that John Bogle had.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Trader Joe »

"Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?"

No, I am not.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Nate79 »

steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
Can you at least tell us what these are? Maybe a link to an analysis from a credible source?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by qwerty123 »

I own some Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but I truly do not understand most of the NFTs I have seen. If anyone does, I'd love to hear an argument for / why I should care about them. It's also possible I'm just not the target market here.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by bberris »

Are we in a bubble yet?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by dru808 »

steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
More serious than Bitcoin? I guess, if you take art and baseball cards seriously.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SlowMovingInvestor »

qwerty123 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 5:32 pm I own some Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but I truly do not understand most of the NFTs I have seen. If anyone does, I'd love to hear an argument for / why I should care about them. It's also possible I'm just not the target market here.
Do you mean you don't understand specific NFTs/NFT categories or the whole concept of investing in an NFT ?

Given the long history of investing in collectibles (art, books, comic books) and the problems of provenance, I'd say that NFT investing seems more firmly grounded than bitcoin or some other cryptocurrency investing. But I'm sure there'll be a glut and a collapse at some point.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Ocean77 »

I'm waiting for Boglecoin to come out.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SpaceCowboy »

If an NFT actually gave me ownership of something I really wanted, I'd consider it. Haven't figure out why I'd want to own online art yet, which seems to be a lot of the current offerings.
I do wonder how they will expand to professional sports. There seems to be a lot of interest from the leagues and players in creating NFTs.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Nate79 »

Are we talking about digital trading cards like in this recent thread?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by arcticpineapplecorp. »

bberris wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 7:11 pm Are we in a bubble yet?
considering "The historic Nyan Cat was turned into an NFT and sold for $600,000", I'd say definitely yes.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by nisiprius »

Oicuryy wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 6:21 pm How to Create and Sell Your First NFT
What I gather from this article is that:

1) There's a fee.
On most major digital art marketplaces, there are fees associated with turning your content into an NFT. I'll speak more on that later, but in the meantime, you'll need to purchase some Ethereum (ETH) to cover the costs of creating your first NFT.
2) A high fee.
Why is it so expensive to create NFTs?
Turning a piece of content into an NFT requires a new one-of-a-kind digital coin to be minted on the blockchain. The creation of this coin requires a fairly complex computational task involving an entire network of computers.
3) The author of the article created one and it is for sale for 0.012 ETH = $18 as I write this.

Image

In other words, the article title is "How to Create and Sell your First NFT Token," but all that is actually covered in the article is
  • How to pay fees.
Mostly the article is an overview of three different ways to pay fees, and five different places you can pay them to.

I feel that there should be more to it, somehow, than paying fees, but that seems to be the end of the article.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by qwerty123 »

SlowMovingInvestor wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 7:22 pm
qwerty123 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 5:32 pm I own some Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but I truly do not understand most of the NFTs I have seen. If anyone does, I'd love to hear an argument for / why I should care about them. It's also possible I'm just not the target market here.
Do you mean you don't understand specific NFTs/NFT categories or the whole concept of investing in an NFT ?

Given the long history of investing in collectibles (art, books, comic books) and the problems of provenance, I'd say that NFT investing seems more firmly grounded than bitcoin or some other cryptocurrency investing. But I'm sure there'll be a glut and a collapse at some point.
Specifically, I don't understand the current market, where people are buying and reselling images, sports game videos, etc. Ownership of the item gives you.. nothing. You don't get the rights to resell the actual video to tv networks, you don't seem to really own anything besides something that someone else might want to pay you money for. I will admit, I don't get pokemon cards, baseball cards, etc (I somewhat can get art).
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Triple digit golfer »

This is one of the stupidest things I've ever seen.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by surfstar »

Its like paying for a one-time use coupon code, except that it has no value.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SlowMovingInvestor »

I believe you can resell some NFTs, in some cases, the original owner gets a portion of the sale price. It's whatever is specified in the smart contract.

Honestly, I think a lot of applications don't really need blockchain. But for 'art' with it's provenance and theft issues, a distributed ledger can be really useful. Indeed, it makes more sense than paying for something available in 10s of millions, like most/all crypto-tokens (including BTC).

And it can mean the original artist reaps some benefit from resales.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SEAworld9 »

Yes there are valid and useful applications for NFTs. Yes people are making insane amount of money on them. Yes they have value as people are willing to pay for them. No this isn’t the right forum to discuss them.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ohboy! »

nisiprius wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 8:38 pm
Oicuryy wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 6:21 pm How to Create and Sell Your First NFT
What I gather from this article is that:

1) There's a fee.
On most major digital art marketplaces, there are fees associated with turning your content into an NFT. I'll speak more on that later, but in the meantime, you'll need to purchase some Ethereum (ETH) to cover the costs of creating your first NFT.
2) A high fee.
Why is it so expensive to create NFTs?
Turning a piece of content into an NFT requires a new one-of-a-kind digital coin to be minted on the blockchain. The creation of this coin requires a fairly complex computational task involving an entire network of computers.
3) The author of the article created one and it is for sale for 0.012 ETH = $18 as I write this.

Image

In other words, the article title is "How to Create and Sell your First NFT Token," but all that is actually covered in the article is
  • How to pay fees.
Mostly the article is an overview of three different ways to pay fees, and five different places you can pay them to.

I feel that there should be more to it, somehow, than paying fees, but that seems to be the end of the article.
Fees are high on Ethereum lately. Though minting NFT’s for $40 that are sold for hundreds of thousands is probably not a big concern. Ethereum scaling is set to grow by orders of magnitude this month via Optimism layer2.

NFTs are minted on other blockchains though for pennies. The very popular NBA authentic NFTs are on a different chain for example.

The easiest analogy I have heard for people to understand NFT value is sports cards. You can copy a sports card but it will be worthless. This applies to any art I suppose as well. NFTs convey ownership, licensing and authenticity.

Mark Cuban is quite hyped on the tech and has pointed out it will translate to things like intellectual property. Really the applications are endless. And for the crypto space it’s more advertising as popular people advertise their ventures into the space.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by watchnerd »

How are these taxed?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by watchnerd »

steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
Is ‘invest’ the right verb?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by steve321 »

SEAworld9 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 9:54 pm Yes there are valid and useful applications for NFTs. Yes people are making insane amount of money on them. Yes they have value as people are willing to pay for them. No this isn’t the right forum to discuss them.
Can you suggest a good forum for people who don't have much knowledge in Tech?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ivk5 »

Late to the thread but I'll offer the best wisdom I've heard on questions like these.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QuSuKcrAeU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ac7G7xOG2Ag
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Wricha »

steve321 wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 2:13 am
SEAworld9 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 9:54 pm Yes there are valid and useful applications for NFTs. Yes people are making insane amount of money on them. Yes they have value as people are willing to pay for them. No this isn’t the right forum to discuss them.
Can you suggest a good forum for people who don't have much knowledge in Tech?
Thanks for posting. I had no idea this existed. Not saying I am buyer/investor of anything!
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Tinkerer-in-Chief »

Based solely on this thread, it strikes me that NFTs are a clever way of making trust-less, decentralised deeds and titles. This uses the technology to solve a real problem, and can make the transaction costs worth it for the benefit the token provides.

What sort of investment will reflect the use value of these tokens, though? Underlying governance tokens? ETH? The sports teams, auction houses, artists and other businesses able to potentially benefit from the technology’s usefulness?

I’m not sure of the answers to those questions, and one needs to be when weighing the risk/reward of this technology. Interested to hear others thoughts.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by steve321 »

I think I understand so far, but please correct me if I am wrong, is that non fungible tokens will make you the owner of things on the digital space like digital art.
However copies which are exactly the same ss the original are available for free on the net for everyone to enjoy.
So being the owner doesn't give you any advantage apart from being able to say that you are the owner.
I mean if you own a Raphael and you'll hang it in your living room you will be able to enjoy it and all copies whether by hand or digital would be inferior so they would not give you the same enjoyment.
But since in digital art copies are exactly the same as the original being the owner doesn't mean much as far as I understand. What do you think?
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by mmcmonster »

Maybe this is useful for professional photographers? Just store all your images on a website and let companies take what they want and then pay for it with NFTs.

If a private user "steals" the image, there's no harm done since that private user would never pay for it anyway.

But if a website copies the image, it should be easier for the original photographer to take him to court and use the NFT to prove that he has ownership of the original.

In this way, NFTs can potentially allow the photographers to bypass Getty Images and other resellers.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Orangutan »

It's an interesting space and very useful tech. Think of royalties for anything. Now McGraw-hill can continue to screw students by ensuring royalties are embedded into the contracts.

If one were to get involved it's probably not on the token side, but more an equity investment and getting your hands dirty with potential projects and teams.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by steve321 »

mmcmonster wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 4:51 am Maybe this is useful for professional photographers? Just store all your images on a website and let companies take what they want and then pay for it with NFTs.

If a private user "steals" the image, there's no harm done since that private user would never pay for it anyway.

But if a website copies the image, it should be easier for the original photographer to take him to court and use the NFT to prove that he has ownership of the original.

In this way, NFTs can potentially allow the photographers to bypass Getty Images and other resellers.
Good point. But like you say if you are a private user I would see no point in owning the picture since you can just enjoy looking at it without buying it.
It's not like the Vatican owning the Sistine Chapel, since looking at the original frescoes by Michelangelo is clearly different from looking at pictures of it.
With the digital work of a photographer you get the same experience whether you own it or not.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Gundy »

I just updated my list of "Things I'll Never Invest In"
1) Timeshare
2) Bitcoin
3) NFT
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by TomatoTomahto »

Ocean77 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 7:29 pm I'm waiting for Boglecoin to come out.
That’s funny.
I get the FI part but not the RE part of FIRE.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by steve321 »

Gundy wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 6:50 am I just updated my list of "Things I'll Never Invest In"
1) Timeshare
2) Bitcoin
3) NFT
I agree on timeshare. Don't know enough about the other two yet
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ribonucleic »

The disproportionate amount of electrical energy consumed by this enterprise has... how can I put this neutrally... hidden costs.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SlowMovingInvestor »

mmcmonster wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 4:51 am Maybe this is useful for professional photographers? Just store all your images on a website and let companies take what they want and then pay for it with NFTs.

If a private user "steals" the image, there's no harm done since that private user would never pay for it anyway.

But if a website copies the image, it should be easier for the original photographer to take him to court and use the NFT to prove that he has ownership of the original.

In this way, NFTs can potentially allow the photographers to bypass Getty Images and other resellers.
There's already technology to digitally watermark a photo. The problem isn't establishing ownership (which is the only thing blockchain really does for you), but finding unauthorized usage and issuing takedowns (blockchain doesn't really help with that).
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by jhfenton »

qwerty123 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 8:53 pm Specifically, I don't understand the current market, where people are buying and reselling images, sports game videos, etc. Ownership of the item gives you.. nothing. You don't get the rights to resell the actual video to tv networks, you don't seem to really own anything besides something that someone else might want to pay you money for. I will admit, I don't get pokemon cards, baseball cards, etc (I somewhat can get art).
I'm in the same place, except that I understand physical collectible cards a little bit. There can be enjoyment from viewing a collectible that you own, and the physicality gives you the ability to exclude others by virtue of your possession of it.

Likewise, I understand the potential of NFTs for art and music. I saw a discussion of one drum riff NFT that included the unlimited rights to reproduce, use, and sample the drum riff. The value is not in the NFT itself, but in the collection of legal rights attached to it. And that could also work for digital art. An NFT could allow an artist to import the exclusivity offered by physicality into the digital world. An artist could grant a single owner of a digital painting NFT total ownership with the right to reproduce and create derivative works—similar to the buyer of a single physical painting—or grant a set of owners limited rights to reproduce for personal use—similar to the buyers of a limited edition print ("One of only 500 made!").

What I don't understand is something like the NBA Top Shot market. I don't see the value in being one of 15,000 "owners" of a "Moment" who have no more ability to enjoy the "Moment" than I do as a "non-owner." The NFT doesn't seem to reflect any bundle of meaningful rights.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by qwerty123 »

jhfenton wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 10:47 am Likewise, I understand the potential of NFTs for art and music. I saw a discussion of one drum riff NFT that included the unlimited rights to reproduce, use, and sample the drum riff. The value is not in the NFT itself, but in the collection of legal rights attached to it. And that could also work for digital art. An NFT could allow an artist to import the exclusivity offered by physicality into the digital world. An artist could grant a single owner of a digital painting NFT total ownership with the right to reproduce and create derivative works—similar to the buyer of a single physical painting—or grant a set of owners limited rights to reproduce for personal use—similar to the buyers of a limited edition print ("One of only 500 made!").

What I don't understand is something like the NBA Top Shot market. I don't see the value in being one of 15,000 "owners" of a "Moment" who have no more ability to enjoy the "Moment" than I do as a "non-owner." The NFT doesn't seem to reflect any bundle of meaningful rights.
Yeah, if the NFT grants ownership or usage rights, it makes a lot more sense to me. It would be neat to be able to buy music, movies etc via NFTs, and then be able to play the music / movie on any platform of your choosing (rather than the current model where you "own" the ability to play the movie / music on the platform you purchased it on, but cannot movie it around, and are screwed if the platform doesn't renew it's license to play the media).

I actually had a similar discussion about NBA Top Shot recently. My friend is making very good money trading them (his realized gains are >> the money he originally put in), but I still do not understand the market at all. In the past I traded "MLB Champions" on Ethereum, and made money, but the remaining players I have are basically worth nothing now - they moved to a new platform, and as far as I can tell, just gave up on the old Ethereum based version.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by bberris »

SlowMovingInvestor wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:35 am
mmcmonster wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 4:51 am Maybe this is useful for professional photographers? Just store all your images on a website and let companies take what they want and then pay for it with NFTs.

If a private user "steals" the image, there's no harm done since that private user would never pay for it anyway.

But if a website copies the image, it should be easier for the original photographer to take him to court and use the NFT to prove that he has ownership of the original.

In this way, NFTs can potentially allow the photographers to bypass Getty Images and other resellers.
There's already technology to digitally watermark a photo. The problem isn't establishing ownership (which is the only thing blockchain really does for you), but finding unauthorized usage and issuing takedowns (blockchain doesn't really help with that).
I'd be really pissed if someone stole my picture of a banana taped to something. This reminds of that old 10cc song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7dgRxpx6XY

Art for art's sake, money for God's sake.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by SlowMovingInvestor »

Virtual Sneaker NFTs too had a very successful auction a few days ago.

I think NFTs make sense for some types of 'art' and collectibles (maybe more so than many cryptocurrencies), but virtual sneakers ..

And digital pets too ..
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Post by alpenglow »

Deleted - I misattributed the creator of the banana.
Last edited by alpenglow on Thu Mar 04, 2021 8:31 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by ccf »

steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
I think that NFTs are *amazing* for artists and other creators who are trying to make a living in a digital world.

I collect art prints as well as vinyl records from independent labels. I don't need more physical items in my house and I will happily collect NFT versions of the same if artists that I am a fan of offer them at comparable prices. I am not sure if that is possible at the moment because of transaction costs.

As an investment, I don't speculate on collectibles and I'm not going to start now :)
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Post by UnLearnYourself »

qwerty123 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 5:32 pm I own some Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but I truly do not understand most of the NFTs I have seen. If anyone does, I'd love to hear an argument for / why I should care about them. It's also possible I'm just not the target market here.
Mark Cuban said they were good, so that just about settles it right?

Basically it is digital art that the owner has a blockchain record of, and as such it cannot be replicated or forged. Baseball cards, art, and just random images have been seen selling for thousands and even tens of thousands of dollars. It all sounds insane to me. But people are paying the prices.

Now years could pass and we may simply view this fad as the 2020s version of Beanie Babies or baseball cards in the 90s...but at least for the time being its happening on real levels.

For the record I own none...but find it fascinating to at least be aware of.
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Post by mouth »

ribonucleic wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:08 am The disproportionate amount of electrical energy consumed by this enterprise has... how can I put this neutrally... hidden costs.
Cryptocurrencies use proof-of-work to award the next block, aka mining, aka energy; and you're 100% correct on that front
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56012952

Not all blockchain utilizes proof-of-work to maintain the database; but it does consume storage, so that's a concern.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/blockchain.asp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockchain

Bottom line, NFT doesn't have to consume energy to be a viable and secure implementation of blockchain.

That said, NFT is digital Cabbage Patch Dolls regardless of what it's applied to; aka false scarcity. But worse, because literally anyone can copy the thing, and the only difference is the missing digital "certificate of authenticity" which itself is meaningless in the digital world.

Without getting into a debate about the relative worth of a real, painted by their own hand, painting like a Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Etc, at least those are real physical items that someone can say were the physical item touched by the painter as opposed to a painted copy or print. No such tangible difference exists with an NFT'ed "object" except for the people who decide 00101000110001 is inferior to 00101000110001 + 0001 where the 0001 is the NFT bit (example highly simplified of course, but that's what it basically is).

And maybe that really will take off as a thing as there is no shortage of people who crave to be able to say they own a thing no one else does. So long as that desire exists, so will markets for "scarce" items; false or not.
Last edited by mouth on Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
mouth
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by mouth »

ccf wrote: Thu Mar 04, 2021 8:29 am
steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
I think that NFTs are *amazing* for artists and other creators who are trying to make a living in a digital world.

I collect art prints as well as vinyl records from independent labels. I don't need more physical items in my house and I will happily collect NFT versions of the same if artists that I am a fan of offer them at comparable prices. I am not sure if that is possible at the moment because of transaction costs.

As an investment, I don't speculate on collectibles and I'm not going to start now :)
Serious question: if you are a fan of an artist, and want to give them money in recognition of their work and talent, why is an NFT important? You still have the same zeros and ones, they still have your money. Heck, there is literally no difference to you copying it from a friend and then sending money to the artist. And NFT has zero impact on digital copying other than it lacking the ability for someone to say "this is mine and there is a record to prove it"

What is the real value to you of having another series of zeros and ones that are registered in a database as belonging to you for an item that is also verifiably identical to the version without the NFT attached to it?
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ccf
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ccf »

mouth wrote: Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:04 am Serious question: if you are a fan of an artist, and want to give them money in recognition of their work and talent, why is an NFT important? You still have the same zeros and ones, they still have your money. Heck, there is literally no difference to you copying it from a friend and then sending money to the artist.
Sometimes I do just send money to artists, if they have a way to do that, but more often than not I buy the thing that I want to pay them for. Sometimes it is something I want, like a print. Sometimes it is not something I do not want, like digital music downloads.

For prints, there isn't really a market (today) for supporting artists by purchasing high resolution digital prints that I could print and frame. I would love that as I like to rotate the art in my house. I wouldn't have to store them and I could print them on my large format printer in whatever size I like. I hope that NFTs create that market.

For music, I would love to be able to pay for music in a way where that "owned" music will be accessible to me regardless of what formats and streaming services exist in the future. If I could have an app with my music and album covers and liner notes and a music collection that would work on a variety of platforms now and in the future, because it could verify my ownership, I would be so happy. Same for books and poetry and comics and 3d printer designs. I will stop buying ebooks from Amazon as soon as I possibly can.

I think that these things are going to happen and that NFTs will create a new type of "digital ownership" in contrast to where we are today where everything feels like platform lock-in. I also think that NFTs will change the game when it comes to royalties for using artists' work.


Right now, NFTs are not very mainstream and I haven't seen any creatives that I follow using them apart from Robin Sloan's experiment: see "A Coat Check Ticket, A Magic Spell" https://society.robinsloan.com/archive/art-objects/

So yeah - the technology is exciting, and I understand why high profile artists like Beeple are making huge sales, but I don't understand all of the speculation on random digital art. It's just a form of beanie babies. An artist that I follow on Instagram sold 100 prints on one of the NFT platforms the other day. She only has a few thousand followers on Instagram but because it was promoted on the platform, people were buying 3,4,5 copies. It's hard to imagine that people will be able to unload them for more money later.

I would not speculate on NFTs or on the success of any of the platforms that currently offer them. The exciting part is the idea and the blockchain that enables the idea. So far I have bid on one print but could not get it for the price that I was willing to pay. I also tried an NFT based video game.
Last edited by ccf on Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Watty
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Watty »

steve321 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 11:40 am I've seen a few comments on the net on NFTs. 
Apparently  they are a more serious investment  than Bitcoin.
Anyone invest in them and what are your thoughts on them?
I have also seen a few threads and articles about things like digital playing cards and art.

They have ALL been about how you might be able to make a gazillion dollars by buying them and then getting lucky.

I have never once seen anyone say something like, "I am a basketball fan and I love having this digital playing card just so that I can enjoy looking at it."

The total lack of non-financial interest in them is telling and to me makes them basically look like poker chips to gamble with.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by Patzer »

Ocean77 wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 7:29 pm I'm waiting for Boglecoin to come out.
I should create a Boglecoin.
It would be a semi-stable coin backed, by 70% Total Market and 30% Total Bond. :)
But, if I market it just right, it will sell for 10x NAV!
After all, it is going to be worth more in the future!
Last edited by Patzer on Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
mouth
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by mouth »

ccf wrote: Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:23 am
mouth wrote: Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:04 am Serious question: if you are a fan of an artist, and want to give them money in recognition of their work and talent, why is an NFT important? You still have the same zeros and ones, they still have your money. Heck, there is literally no difference to you copying it from a friend and then sending money to the artist.
Sometimes I do just send money to artists, if they have a way to do that, but more often than not I buy the thing that I want to pay them for. Sometimes it is something I want, like a print. Sometimes it is not something I do not want, like digital music downloads.

For prints, there isn't really a market (today) for supporting artists by purchasing high resolution digital prints that I could print and frame. I would love that as I like to rotate the art in my house. I wouldn't have to store them and I could print them on my large format printer in whatever size I like. I hope that NFTs create that market.

For music, I would love to be able to pay for music in a way where that "owned" music will be accessible to me regardless of what formats and streaming services exist in the future. If I could have an app with my music and album covers and liner notes and a music collection that would work on a variety of platforms now and in the future, because it could verify my ownership, I would be so happy. Same for books and poetry and comics and 3d printer designs. I will stop buying ebooks from Amazon as soon as I possibly can.

I think that these things are going to happen and that NFTs will create a new type of "digital ownership" in contrast to where we are today where everything feels like platform lock-in. I also think that NFTs will change the game when it comes to royalties for using artists' work.


Right now, NFTs are not very mainstream and I haven't seen any creatives that I follow using them apart from Robin Sloan's experiment: see "A Coat Check Ticket, A Magic Spell" https://society.robinsloan.com/archive/art-objects/

So yeah - the technology is exciting, and I understand why high profile artists like Beeple are making huge sales, but I don't understand all of the speculation on random digital art. It's just a form of beanie babies. An artist that I follow on Instagram sold 100 prints on one of the NFT platforms the other day. She only has a few thousand followers on Instagram but because it was promoted on the platform, people were buying 3,4,5 copies. It's hard to imagine that people will be able to unload them for more money later.

I would not speculate on NFTs or on the success of any of the platforms that currently offer them. The exciting part is the idea and the blockchain that enables the idea. So far I have bid on one print but could not get it for the price that I was willing to pay. I also tried an NFT based video game.
A fair position particularly on the concept of NFT fostering a market to benefit artists. Time will tell. I'm not convinced it will be transformative in the way you hope. I don't see how NFT solves the problem of connecting artists to people willing to pay for their art. Today that problem can be solved by an artist having a webpage, presence on social media, and a means to accept payment at a commercially viable price that doesn't drive most people to just copy it. Remember NFT does nothing to prevent copying, it only serves to assert provenance and ownership.

But like I said, time will tell and I could be wrong. It doesn't have to solve the above problems 100%; anything that moves the needle can be helpful if there aren't 2nd order impacts.

Of course the "investment" situation and insane values is an entirely different topic and is the literal definition of false scarcity and novelty. It'll take a LOT of evidence to prove otherwise. I wonder if this would be even half the thing it is right now sans COVID lockdown.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ohboy! »

Some people are really stubborn when it comes to anything new. NFTs have loads of use cases. It bogles my mind that one can accept cardboard prints of baseball players being worth loads of money or literal rocks, but NFTs are too hard to comprehend.
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Re: Non-fungible tokens (NFTs): anyone investing in those?

Post by ccf »

My hope, and this is very rose-colored glasses, is that a mechanism for digital goods ownership and provenance will make it possible to separate the distribution platform from the content.

For example, imagine a producer of hardware ereader or ereader software or a music player that does not have to concern themselves with selling content, licensing, or royalties. A consumer that has portability and choice that they didn't have before.
Last edited by ccf on Thu Mar 04, 2021 10:28 am, edited 2 times in total.
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