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> A common skepticism is that someone can just take a screenshot of the image or get a digital file so it’s not really scarce. However, the same argument could

> A common skepticism is that someone can just take a screenshot of the image or get a digital file so it’s not really scarce. However, the same argument could apply to physical items as well. Anyone can take a photo of the Mona Lisa or create a replica of it, but it isn’t the real item from the artist. People are willing to pay a premium for the original work. Another interesting aspect of digital art or collectibles is that you can easily verify the item’s ownership history. Some digital items might be worth more depending on who owned it in the past. The copy of a digital image is 1:1 with the original. A print of the Mona Lisa wasn't painted by Leonardo da Vinci. It's a completely different painting. It's possible to take their argument even farther though. You don't actually own the original digital image unless you have the hard drive it was originally saved on in your possession.

nipponese 6y ago
I have heard the NFT art narrative many times and I still can't understand how it makes sense except in the one exception where the platform for displaying the art is a walled garden (yes, permissioned). For example, maybe there are a few virtual world platforms that agree they will accept NFTs that adhere to a specific protocol, or the digital picture frame is authorized to display the art.
- maxwell 6y ago
  The flex is displaying the artwork you own. A CryptoPunk avatar is now the digital equivalent to wearing a Rolex. Setting your avatar to someone else's CryptoPunk is like wearing a fake Rolex, or posting a selfie wearing someone else's watch.
ahnick 6y ago
I think it's easier to understand in the analogy of signed vs unsigned baseball cards. The images on the baseball cards are identical, but the only difference is the baseball player's signature is on one and not the other. This is just the digital equivalent.
- mekkkkkk 6y ago
  Perhaps I'm a total boomer, but I just can't imagine feeling that way about an "original" JPEG. A signed baseball card is truly unique, and the signature is an almost (albeit weak) physical connection with the signee. I cannot fully describe why a digital proof seems less valuable. It's like comparing an email signed by someones crypto cert vs a printed letter with a signature. It's just ... different.
  - detaro 6y ago
    I feel similarly about the JPG, and there are a few (IMHO) interesting variations to think about: How do you feel about a a printed digital photo or printed digital painting? How if there's more than one print, but e.g. a limited edition of 50? How about "30$ for the JPG and the right to print it for yourself"? About "there's only 10 copies of this artsy computer game"?
detaro 6y ago
Paintings are not the best example (although even there: plenty of paintings that can be forged perfectly, and some where the originals have not actually been painted by "the artist"), but lots of Art can be perfectly reproduced and the generally accepted value is still in "the original(s)", not any of the reproduction. Some installation pieces literally only exist as instructions on how to create them - and still the right to make "the one" is a valuable thing sold. Film works might exist as a limited set of perfectly copyable DVDs - pretty much the hard drive concept you propose. That it works like that is in many ways convention - and copyright law. NFTs are pretty much the same: of course you can copy the pixels or source code, but the presumed value is in holding the token that has been defined as representing ownership of it - with the additional argument that that is harder to fake. If that is something you consider valuable and want to spend on is a personal thing (I personally don't), but it works as long as enough people agree that that's how it works. And blockchain stuff has right now lots of money floating around, and Art can even provide additional perceived legitimacy, so the market of people to agree on that is there.
- ketamine__ 6y ago
  Isn't the distinction that da Vinci put his brush to wood on the original Mona Lisa? How do you duplicate that?
  - detaro 6y ago
    Right, you can't. But you can make (in principle, again, a classic painting like the Mona Lisa is not the best example, it's more obvious for e.g. a print) an indistinguishable copy - and that copy does not have the distinction of da Vinci's touch and thus is not equal to the original. And similarly, you can define an equivalent of the "creators touch" for a digital file and agree with others that that's what makes it an original and valuable over a mere bit-identical copy. And the examples in between do the same to varying degrees, to show that the idea of not actually requiring a direct "touch" is not new in the Art world, with originality more treated as what in software we'd call a "license": rules the artist decided.
splintercell 6y ago
> A print of the Mona Lisa wasn't painted by Leonardo da Vinci. It's a completely different painting. Are you saying that if we were able to do an atom by atom copy of Mona Lisa (by a Replicator from Star Wars) then nobody would be interested in seeing the actual painting where the hands of Leornado da Vinci touched the canvas himself, which 'object' has millions of people have laid their eyes on? How about an even simpler example, you can deploy the open source copy of wikipedia on your own domain name 'wikipaydiya.com' (or any domain), populate it with the database dump which wikipedia provides, and connect it with a script which will update the database in real time from wikipedia itself (So all updates on wikipedia by people will be reflected on this clone website. Do you think now this 'clone wikipedia' has the same value in the market as wikipedia.org because its a complete copy? Maybe the value of Mona Lisa comes from the fact that far more people are willing to see it than an atom level copy of it?
- bagpuss 6y ago
  > replicator from Star Wars "juice; jabba, chilled"
- remram 6y ago
  Turn that on its head, would you be unwilling to buy the Mona Lisa after it has been teleported once (by a transporter from Star Trek)? We're both pretty far out from reality though, but they are similar arguments. As for your wikipedia point, I don't get it. The domain name 'wikipedia.org' has value, and not owning the domain does not get you the value of the domain. Obviously.
  - splintercell 6y ago
    > As for your wikipedia point, I don't get it. The domain name 'wikipedia.org' has value, and not owning the domain does not get you the value of the domain. Obviously. That's the point, the domain Wikipedia has value, and that value is nontransferable even if someone else copies and puts the whole data somewhere else, because its the traffic which comes to it. Similarly, if a museum in Atlanta purchases Mona Lisa, they know that they will get the traffic coming for Mona Lisa at Louvre, to this museum in Georgia. This means sale of tickets, and other revenue. SO the price of real Mona Lisa carries that value appreciation with it. Now I can answer this question: > Turn that on its head, would you be unwilling to buy the Mona Lisa after it has been teleported once (by a transporter from Star Trek)? It would depend, would people be willing to pay to see that Mona Lisa? If yes then the answer to your question is similar. Finally, the most important thing most people don't understand. With the NFT (in almost all the cases) people are purchasing the licensing rights of an object too. Buy the NFT [1] of Andrew Jones' "Dharma Dragon"[2] and get the licensing rights to all prints, and other usage of the image. 1. https://superrare.co/artwork-v2/dharma-dragon-14834 https://superrare.co/artwork-v2/dharma-dragon-14834 2. https://androidjones-obtain.com/products/dharma-dragon https://androidjones-obtain.com/products/dharma-dragon
jayd16 6y ago
Like all DRM, DRM on the blockchain is pretty terrible. I think having access to a digital asset while not being able to copy that asset is basically impossible. Although I think there's one place this makes sense and that's as official loot in a game. In that case, it really is not about accessing the data but more about the ownership of the item the data describes. Something like that allows for a federated game that (perhaps ironically) supports an "official" loot economy managed by a single authority.
- detaro 6y ago
  NFTs aren't usually "DRM" in the sense that they are intended to (or even try to) stop you from accessing the file.
  - jayd16 6y ago
    DRM in that its digital rights management.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
jamespitts 6y ago
> The copy of a digital image is 1:1 with the original. Not in the case of an NFT. Accompanying the image data is a cryptographically-enforced means to assign control to a user / key holder. This control is either over a single, unique art piece or over a certain number in a limited set of duplicates of the art piece. While the image data can be seen as non-unique, the user can be confident that the copy which they control represents ownership of a unique asset with the ability to trace provenance back to the artist.

nipponese 6y ago

I have heard the NFT art narrative many times and I still can't understand how it makes sense except in the one exception where the platform for displaying the art is a walled garden (yes, permissioned). For example, maybe there are a few virtual world platforms that agree they will accept NFTs that adhere to a specific protocol, or the digital picture frame is authorized to display the art.

maxwell 6y ago
The flex is displaying the artwork you own. A CryptoPunk avatar is now the digital equivalent to wearing a Rolex. Setting your avatar to someone else's CryptoPunk is like wearing a fake Rolex, or posting a selfie wearing someone else's watch.

ahnick 6y ago

I think it's easier to understand in the analogy of signed vs unsigned baseball cards. The images on the baseball cards are identical, but the only difference is the baseball player's signature is on one and not the other. This is just the digital equivalent.

mekkkkkk 6y ago
Perhaps I'm a total boomer, but I just can't imagine feeling that way about an "original" JPEG. A signed baseball card is truly unique, and the signature is an almost (albeit weak) physical connection with the signee. I cannot fully describe why a digital proof seems less valuable. It's like comparing an email signed by someones crypto cert vs a printed letter with a signature. It's just ... different.
- detaro 6y ago
  I feel similarly about the JPG, and there are a few (IMHO) interesting variations to think about: How do you feel about a a printed digital photo or printed digital painting? How if there's more than one print, but e.g. a limited edition of 50? How about "30$ for the JPG and the right to print it for yourself"? About "there's only 10 copies of this artsy computer game"?

detaro 6y ago

Paintings are not the best example (although even there: plenty of paintings that can be forged perfectly, and some where the originals have not actually been painted by "the artist"), but lots of Art can be perfectly reproduced and the generally accepted value is still in "the original(s)", not any of the reproduction. Some installation pieces literally only exist as instructions on how to create them - and still the right to make "the one" is a valuable thing sold. Film works might exist as a limited set of perfectly copyable DVDs - pretty much the hard drive concept you propose. That it works like that is in many ways convention - and copyright law. NFTs are pretty much the same: of course you can copy the pixels or source code, but the presumed value is in holding the token that has been defined as representing ownership of it - with the additional argument that that is harder to fake. If that is something you consider valuable and want to spend on is a personal thing (I personally don't), but it works as long as enough people agree that that's how it works. And blockchain stuff has right now lots of money floating around, and Art can even provide additional perceived legitimacy, so the market of people to agree on that is there.

ketamine__ 6y ago
Isn't the distinction that da Vinci put his brush to wood on the original Mona Lisa? How do you duplicate that?
- detaro 6y ago
  Right, you can't. But you can make (in principle, again, a classic painting like the Mona Lisa is not the best example, it's more obvious for e.g. a print) an indistinguishable copy - and that copy does not have the distinction of da Vinci's touch and thus is not equal to the original. And similarly, you can define an equivalent of the "creators touch" for a digital file and agree with others that that's what makes it an original and valuable over a mere bit-identical copy. And the examples in between do the same to varying degrees, to show that the idea of not actually requiring a direct "touch" is not new in the Art world, with originality more treated as what in software we'd call a "license": rules the artist decided.

splintercell 6y ago

> A print of the Mona Lisa wasn't painted by Leonardo da Vinci. It's a completely different painting. Are you saying that if we were able to do an atom by atom copy of Mona Lisa (by a Replicator from Star Wars) then nobody would be interested in seeing the actual painting where the hands of Leornado da Vinci touched the canvas himself, which 'object' has millions of people have laid their eyes on? How about an even simpler example, you can deploy the open source copy of wikipedia on your own domain name 'wikipaydiya.com' (or any domain), populate it with the database dump which wikipedia provides, and connect it with a script which will update the database in real time from wikipedia itself (So all updates on wikipedia by people will be reflected on this clone website. Do you think now this 'clone wikipedia' has the same value in the market as wikipedia.org because its a complete copy? Maybe the value of Mona Lisa comes from the fact that far more people are willing to see it than an atom level copy of it?

bagpuss 6y ago
> replicator from Star Wars "juice; jabba, chilled"
remram 6y ago
Turn that on its head, would you be unwilling to buy the Mona Lisa after it has been teleported once (by a transporter from Star Trek)? We're both pretty far out from reality though, but they are similar arguments. As for your wikipedia point, I don't get it. The domain name 'wikipedia.org' has value, and not owning the domain does not get you the value of the domain. Obviously.
- splintercell 6y ago
  > As for your wikipedia point, I don't get it. The domain name 'wikipedia.org' has value, and not owning the domain does not get you the value of the domain. Obviously. That's the point, the domain Wikipedia has value, and that value is nontransferable even if someone else copies and puts the whole data somewhere else, because its the traffic which comes to it. Similarly, if a museum in Atlanta purchases Mona Lisa, they know that they will get the traffic coming for Mona Lisa at Louvre, to this museum in Georgia. This means sale of tickets, and other revenue. SO the price of real Mona Lisa carries that value appreciation with it. Now I can answer this question: > Turn that on its head, would you be unwilling to buy the Mona Lisa after it has been teleported once (by a transporter from Star Trek)? It would depend, would people be willing to pay to see that Mona Lisa? If yes then the answer to your question is similar. Finally, the most important thing most people don't understand. With the NFT (in almost all the cases) people are purchasing the licensing rights of an object too. Buy the NFT [1] of Andrew Jones' "Dharma Dragon"[2] and get the licensing rights to all prints, and other usage of the image. 1. https://superrare.co/artwork-v2/dharma-dragon-14834 https://superrare.co/artwork-v2/dharma-dragon-14834 2. https://androidjones-obtain.com/products/dharma-dragon https://androidjones-obtain.com/products/dharma-dragon

jayd16 6y ago

Like all DRM, DRM on the blockchain is pretty terrible. I think having access to a digital asset while not being able to copy that asset is basically impossible. Although I think there's one place this makes sense and that's as official loot in a game. In that case, it really is not about accessing the data but more about the ownership of the item the data describes. Something like that allows for a federated game that (perhaps ironically) supports an "official" loot economy managed by a single authority.

detaro 6y ago
NFTs aren't usually "DRM" in the sense that they are intended to (or even try to) stop you from accessing the file.
- jayd16 6y ago
  DRM in that its digital rights management.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

jamespitts 6y ago

> The copy of a digital image is 1:1 with the original. Not in the case of an NFT. Accompanying the image data is a cryptographically-enforced means to assign control to a user / key holder. This control is either over a single, unique art piece or over a certain number in a limited set of duplicates of the art piece. While the image data can be seen as non-unique, the user can be confident that the copy which they control represents ownership of a unique asset with the ability to trace provenance back to the artist.