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Ownership and chain of title pre-dates many of the centralized governments that even exist today. For example, who was the monarch of Italy when Da Vinci painte

Ownership and chain of title pre-dates many of the centralized governments that even exist today. For example, who was the monarch of Italy when Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa? How many times has the government changed hands since it was painted? How many times has the painting changed hands? How do you determine the Mona Lisa's authenticity? Many heirlooms go back centuries and pass down through generations even as those generations move jurisdictions. The Nyan cat gif NFT was composed by the original meme creator. That gives it value. What does it mean for a baseball to be autographed with Babe Ruth's signature? If it's authentic, it means a great deal. There's no court of law that is going to validate if a Babe Ruth baseball is authentic or not and whether that fact gives it value or not. That is going to be up to the market of appraisers. The crypto part gives you a perfect chain of custody. I'm giving you a digital item, that is provably rare and verifiably linked to the original creator of the artwork.

lottin 6y ago
Except the concept of authenticity doesn't really apply to digital information. There exist infinitely many copies of any piece of digital art and none of them is more authentic than the others. They are all equally authentic.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  No. The whole point of blockchain and crypto is digital scarcity. Bitcoin has been proving this concept since 2009. Why is a BCH coin cheaper than a BTC coin? Why is a Doge coin cheaper than either? The supply & demand of each is completely different. NFTs are not infinite. They are provably scarce. They not only cost money to mint, but any artist who cheapens their NFTs by distributing too many copies will see the effects in the price and valuation of their art.
  - lottin 6y ago
    Of course, but a work of digital art, which is what we are talking about, is not scarce. There are infinitely many exact copies of it and each copy costs nothing to produce. Anyone pretending that one of the copies is more authentic than the others are kidding themselves.
  - curryst 6y ago
    > NFTs are not infinite. They are provably scarce. But the art itself is not scarce. In the physical realm, it's like a painting that can exactly replicate itself. The certificate of authenticity doesn't, though, and is the scarce component. I think it's reasonable for someone to ask "if the duplicates are always exactly the same, what is the value of a certificate of authenticity? It would be drastically harder to forge a fake than it is to hit the button to make an exact copy". It shifts the entirety of the value away from the art. The art itself is worthless. Anyone that wants a copy of the art can do so with a Google search. You have a scarce digital token proving that you are the rightful owner of a worthless piece of art. That's why I don't see it working.
    - vgel 6y ago
      I'm not necessarily an NFT proponent, but to be fair, you can also duplicate art in the real world. Forgeries and replicas of the Mona Lisa and other famous art exist, and are sometimes so good they fool museum curators for years. Yet, they're almost worthless compared to the original. Why?
      - dwrowe 6y ago
        Because they’re still “almost”. The NFT is made up of digits values that can be replicated exactly - a brush stroke or photography negative cannot.
      - lottin 6y ago
        Reproductions are not "worthless" by any stretch of the imagination. They are worth less than the original but this is easily understandable. It's because they are not the same thing. On the other hand, digital copies are exact to one another and also mass produced by a machine (a computer) and thus not having a different "story" that could set them apart.
ballenf 6y ago
The concept of private property or ownership predates all government. Of course governments and police rarely get involved with small property disputes unless part of something larger like an assault. Smartphone locking is similar to NFTs in that it is an extrajudicial process of enforcing property rights. Likewise we also have algorithms that can take away all your photos and emails with basically no recourse to government or person. NFTs just don’t seem that different to many things we’re already doing.
- kubanczyk 6y ago
  As long as you don't put an armed guard around, the property depends only on the law. The law depends mostly on the population paying attention to the jurys' verdicts. Without that, there is nothing stopping me from selling/buying/giving/using/renting a gif, a building, a village, or a city. E.g. what apes have is not a property. You only keep stuff as long as your alpha doesn't want it. That's a different concept.

lottin 6y ago

Except the concept of authenticity doesn't really apply to digital information. There exist infinitely many copies of any piece of digital art and none of them is more authentic than the others. They are all equally authentic.

chrisco255 6y ago
No. The whole point of blockchain and crypto is digital scarcity. Bitcoin has been proving this concept since 2009. Why is a BCH coin cheaper than a BTC coin? Why is a Doge coin cheaper than either? The supply & demand of each is completely different. NFTs are not infinite. They are provably scarce. They not only cost money to mint, but any artist who cheapens their NFTs by distributing too many copies will see the effects in the price and valuation of their art.
- lottin 6y ago
  Of course, but a work of digital art, which is what we are talking about, is not scarce. There are infinitely many exact copies of it and each copy costs nothing to produce. Anyone pretending that one of the copies is more authentic than the others are kidding themselves.
- curryst 6y ago
  > NFTs are not infinite. They are provably scarce. But the art itself is not scarce. In the physical realm, it's like a painting that can exactly replicate itself. The certificate of authenticity doesn't, though, and is the scarce component. I think it's reasonable for someone to ask "if the duplicates are always exactly the same, what is the value of a certificate of authenticity? It would be drastically harder to forge a fake than it is to hit the button to make an exact copy". It shifts the entirety of the value away from the art. The art itself is worthless. Anyone that wants a copy of the art can do so with a Google search. You have a scarce digital token proving that you are the rightful owner of a worthless piece of art. That's why I don't see it working.
  - vgel 6y ago
    I'm not necessarily an NFT proponent, but to be fair, you can also duplicate art in the real world. Forgeries and replicas of the Mona Lisa and other famous art exist, and are sometimes so good they fool museum curators for years. Yet, they're almost worthless compared to the original. Why?
    - dwrowe 6y ago
      Because they’re still “almost”. The NFT is made up of digits values that can be replicated exactly - a brush stroke or photography negative cannot.
    - lottin 6y ago
      Reproductions are not "worthless" by any stretch of the imagination. They are worth less than the original but this is easily understandable. It's because they are not the same thing. On the other hand, digital copies are exact to one another and also mass produced by a machine (a computer) and thus not having a different "story" that could set them apart.

ballenf 6y ago

The concept of private property or ownership predates all government. Of course governments and police rarely get involved with small property disputes unless part of something larger like an assault. Smartphone locking is similar to NFTs in that it is an extrajudicial process of enforcing property rights. Likewise we also have algorithms that can take away all your photos and emails with basically no recourse to government or person. NFTs just don’t seem that different to many things we’re already doing.

kubanczyk 6y ago
As long as you don't put an armed guard around, the property depends only on the law. The law depends mostly on the population paying attention to the jurys' verdicts. Without that, there is nothing stopping me from selling/buying/giving/using/renting a gif, a building, a village, or a city. E.g. what apes have is not a property. You only keep stuff as long as your alpha doesn't want it. That's a different concept.