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The distributed ledger adds security, longevity, ownership, and provenance: eg. a token is purchased from an artist, and it can be held and traded (ie. "owned")

The distributed ledger adds security, longevity, ownership, and provenance: eg. a token is purchased from an artist, and it can be held and traded (ie. "owned") for as many years as the blockchain continues to survive. Unlike the ownership of a file or record in a centralized database, which are mutable and based on a single source of trust, the blockchain acts as a social consensus mechanism, i.e. we can all agree that "wallet X owns digital token Y". To your second point: much of today's art is not manifested by a single physical artefact. Conceptual art has been around for a long time; ownership of conceptual art is not new[1], but the advent of blockchain gives a new vehicle and distribution mechanism for it, in particular digital and software art. [1] - https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-conceptual-art-meant-collected-sells-six-figures https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-conceptual-art...

creshal 5y ago
> The distributed ledger adds security, longevity, ownership, and provenance: eg. a token is purchased from an artist, and it can be held and traded (ie. "owned") for as many years as the blockchain continues to survive. Unlike the ownership of a file or record in a centralized database, which are mutable and based on a single source of trust, the blockchain acts as a social consensus mechanism, i.e. we can all agree that "wallet X owns digital token Y." Is there any advantage over a traditional certificate signed by PKI? I'd say the risk of X.509 PKI in its entirety disappearing is significantly lower than the risk of any individual blockchain startup failing. (How's that for decentralised redundancy!) > To your second point: much of today's art is not manifested by a single physical artefact. Conceptual art has been around for a long time; ownership of conceptual art is not new[1] but the advent of blockchain gives a new vehicle and distribution mechanism for it, in particular digital and software art. So we're back to hype for the sake of hype, detached from any technical merit.
- mattdesl 5y ago
  I don't know much about PKI but it seems to rely on certification authorities (i.e. single source of trust) and there does not seem to be a clear mechanism for artists to sign, trade, and 'own' them. But, if you were to create a PKI-enabled digital art marketplace that is able to meet the same decentralized structure and benefits of NFT technology, without the need for a distributed ledger and tokenization, I'm sure many artists and creators would welcome that.

creshal 5y ago

> The distributed ledger adds security, longevity, ownership, and provenance: eg. a token is purchased from an artist, and it can be held and traded (ie. "owned") for as many years as the blockchain continues to survive. Unlike the ownership of a file or record in a centralized database, which are mutable and based on a single source of trust, the blockchain acts as a social consensus mechanism, i.e. we can all agree that "wallet X owns digital token Y." Is there any advantage over a traditional certificate signed by PKI? I'd say the risk of X.509 PKI in its entirety disappearing is significantly lower than the risk of any individual blockchain startup failing. (How's that for decentralised redundancy!) > To your second point: much of today's art is not manifested by a single physical artefact. Conceptual art has been around for a long time; ownership of conceptual art is not new[1] but the advent of blockchain gives a new vehicle and distribution mechanism for it, in particular digital and software art. So we're back to hype for the sake of hype, detached from any technical merit.

mattdesl 5y ago
I don't know much about PKI but it seems to rely on certification authorities (i.e. single source of trust) and there does not seem to be a clear mechanism for artists to sign, trade, and 'own' them. But, if you were to create a PKI-enabled digital art marketplace that is able to meet the same decentralized structure and benefits of NFT technology, without the need for a distributed ledger and tokenization, I'm sure many artists and creators would welcome that.