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> Most of these arguments apply to recently produced art in general, don't they? Historical art is a little different, being a kind of combination of antiques a

> Most of these arguments apply to recently produced art in general, don't they? Historical art is a little different, being a kind of combination of antiques and arts. But none of your arguments apply to 'art in general' at all, do they? Because when you "buy art" you are actually... buying a piece of art. The way we value 'art' obviously has culturally historical oddities attached to it. But none of them are comparable to what people are paying for when 'buying' NFTs (ie: their name in a database). Which was the entire point of the Twitter thread.

ben_w 5y ago
Eh, I can see a difference between commissioning a new piece (or likewise attending a live performance or a cinema) and spending the cost of the average U.K. home on William Shatner’s prop phaser: https://www.today.com/popculture/william-shatners-star-trek-phaser-sells-231-000-auction-1C9255440 https://www.today.com/popculture/william-shatners-star-trek-...
Tenoke 5y ago
>But none of your arguments apply to 'art in general' at all, do they? Because when you "buy art" you are actually... buying a piece of art. It's naive to think that the majority of the value of buying a painting of a pure black square comes from having the physical painting itself rather than almost exclusively out of the story and recognition by others. Once you recognize that it's not so hard to see that you can remove the physical painting aspect altogether.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > that the majority of the value of buying a painting of a pure black square comes from having the physical painting itself rather than almost exclusively out of the story and recognition by others Most art isn’t celebrity art. It’s bought to support the artist and/or the gallery, with the side advantage of having something beautiful and/or culturally meaningful in your home.
  - Tenoke 5y ago
    That doesn't invalidate the argument for the portion that is. And at any rate, there are also NFTs bought just to support the artist, too.
cameronh90 5y ago
You're not just buying "a piece of art" though. If that was the case, duplicates/prints/casts/reproductions or whatever would be worth a substantial portion of the original, relative to their true-ness. The value in owning art isn't the physical object. The value comes from how owning that specific physical object means you "own" that art, whatever that means. I don't really understand why anyone would care about that either, but people clearly do. And even if you disagree with that point, the other points about not owning copyright, lack of intrinsic value and using art for money laundering definitely apply to real art too.

ben_w 5y ago

Eh, I can see a difference between commissioning a new piece (or likewise attending a live performance or a cinema) and spending the cost of the average U.K. home on William Shatner’s prop phaser: https://www.today.com/popculture/william-shatners-star-trek-phaser-sells-231-000-auction-1C9255440 https://www.today.com/popculture/william-shatners-star-trek-...

Tenoke 5y ago

>But none of your arguments apply to 'art in general' at all, do they? Because when you "buy art" you are actually... buying a piece of art. It's naive to think that the majority of the value of buying a painting of a pure black square comes from having the physical painting itself rather than almost exclusively out of the story and recognition by others. Once you recognize that it's not so hard to see that you can remove the physical painting aspect altogether.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> that the majority of the value of buying a painting of a pure black square comes from having the physical painting itself rather than almost exclusively out of the story and recognition by others Most art isn’t celebrity art. It’s bought to support the artist and/or the gallery, with the side advantage of having something beautiful and/or culturally meaningful in your home.
- Tenoke 5y ago
  That doesn't invalidate the argument for the portion that is. And at any rate, there are also NFTs bought just to support the artist, too.

cameronh90 5y ago

You're not just buying "a piece of art" though. If that was the case, duplicates/prints/casts/reproductions or whatever would be worth a substantial portion of the original, relative to their true-ness. The value in owning art isn't the physical object. The value comes from how owning that specific physical object means you "own" that art, whatever that means. I don't really understand why anyone would care about that either, but people clearly do. And even if you disagree with that point, the other points about not owning copyright, lack of intrinsic value and using art for money laundering definitely apply to real art too.