7 ms·

Selling thin pieces of cardboard with images of athletes printed of them, which don't come with any legal rights whatsoever? Oh, that's the sports collectibles

Selling thin pieces of cardboard with images of athletes printed of them, which don't come with any legal rights whatsoever? Oh, that's the sports collectibles trading card industry. NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. You need to do a bit of effort and think about why anything is worth anything at all. Why is the Mona Lisa worth millions but a forgery worth nothing, even if they are indistinguishable from one another?

arcticbull 5y ago
> You need to do a bit of effort and think about why anything is worth anything at all. Why is the Mona Lisa worth millions but a forgery worth nothing, even if they are indistinguishable from one another? How much is a museum map from the Louvre with directions from the entrance to the current location of the Mona Lisa, signed the museum attendant worth haha. They are of course distinguishable. One was actually physically created by the artist. The images the URLs point at are 100% exactly identical, and you do not have the right to the image in question. You may not even have the right to display it to anyone. You're just buying the plastic sleeves the baseball cards come in without the card itself. > NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. [edit] Not really no. After all the provenance is on faith that the person who originally sold the NFT is both the original creator of the work (or authorized to sell it) and that they have the legal right to do so, probably, who even knows. Trust me, the judge is the judge of that, not the blockchain. Blockchains only actually work for concepts wholly encapsulated by the blockchain. Art is not that. And as for permanence, no, it's just a URL. The contents may disappear, even in IPFS.
- coralreef 5y ago
  > Trust me, the judge is the judge of that, not the blockchain. Blockchains only actually work for concepts wholly encapsulated by the blockchain. Art is not that. Art is represented and encapsulated by data. The judge of provenance is society: whatever the buyer deems necessary to prove legitamacy is what sets value. An old rolex with papers is worth more than one without. A rolex that can't be identified as authentic by anyone is worth nothing.
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    Art is represented beyond just the data itself, it's also the legal rights that come alongside it. However, that notwithstanding you're not buying the art. You're not buying the legal rights to the art. You're buying a URL. A signed museum map telling you where you can find art right now. It may in fact just change to different art at some point in the future or disappear entirely, because you bought nothing. An old Rolex with papers is worth more than without, but the papers without the Rolex are worth nothing. In this case you're just buying the papers.
    - coralreef 5y ago
      > you're not buying the art. You're not buying the legal rights to the art. You're buying a URL. A signed museum map telling you where you can find art right now. It may in fact just change to different art at some point in the future or disappear entirely, because you bought nothing. Yes, you're starting to get it. You're not buying art, you're not buying legal rights. If the data was written directly to the blockchain, then it is permanent. But even if it points to some temporary host, big deal, the file itself wasn't the valuable part. Data can endlessly be replicated and rehosted. It is the genuine provenance of an artist that was bought and traded. It is proof representing a work, whatever that artist declares it to be. They could simply resell it again for all anyone knows, but that would hurt them and devalue all their future work. All value is abstract. The papers without the Rolex can be worth anything anyone wants to pay for it. Following that rule I suppose fake papers can even be worth something, but most likely not.
chinathrow 5y ago
> NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. Your blockchain will not be there in the future. Permanence? Not so much.
- coralreef 5y ago
  You have a crystal ball?
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    er, do you?
    - coralreef 5y ago
      The Bitcoin network has produced blocks every 10 minutes since January 3 2009 without fail. It is a decentralized network that has faced the test of government, natural disaster, organizational and technical risk, etc. So no, maybe blockchains won't last "forever", but neither of us enough information to confirm either way. My bet is on blockchains outliving everyone typing on this forum.
      - arcticbull 5y ago
        Sounds like we're both speculating then :)
        coralreef 5y ago
        Sure, if we want to devolve into semantics: NFTs are both worthless and valuable, depending on who you ask.
        arcticbull 5y ago
        That's certainly true
Ekaros 5y ago
I would pay maybe hundred or two hundred for nice indistinguishable replica of Mona Lisa. Not my favourite big, but if it was really really good why not.
Hamuko 5y ago
>NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. Except that nothing about the asset is actually stored on a blockchain.
- coralreef 5y ago
  Other than a signed message publicly associated with a particular entity.

arcticbull 5y ago

> You need to do a bit of effort and think about why anything is worth anything at all. Why is the Mona Lisa worth millions but a forgery worth nothing, even if they are indistinguishable from one another? How much is a museum map from the Louvre with directions from the entrance to the current location of the Mona Lisa, signed the museum attendant worth haha. They are of course distinguishable. One was actually physically created by the artist. The images the URLs point at are 100% exactly identical, and you do not have the right to the image in question. You may not even have the right to display it to anyone. You're just buying the plastic sleeves the baseball cards come in without the card itself. > NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. [edit] Not really no. After all the provenance is on faith that the person who originally sold the NFT is both the original creator of the work (or authorized to sell it) and that they have the legal right to do so, probably, who even knows. Trust me, the judge is the judge of that, not the blockchain. Blockchains only actually work for concepts wholly encapsulated by the blockchain. Art is not that. And as for permanence, no, it's just a URL. The contents may disappear, even in IPFS.

coralreef 5y ago
> Trust me, the judge is the judge of that, not the blockchain. Blockchains only actually work for concepts wholly encapsulated by the blockchain. Art is not that. Art is represented and encapsulated by data. The judge of provenance is society: whatever the buyer deems necessary to prove legitamacy is what sets value. An old rolex with papers is worth more than one without. A rolex that can't be identified as authentic by anyone is worth nothing.
- arcticbull 5y ago
  Art is represented beyond just the data itself, it's also the legal rights that come alongside it. However, that notwithstanding you're not buying the art. You're not buying the legal rights to the art. You're buying a URL. A signed museum map telling you where you can find art right now. It may in fact just change to different art at some point in the future or disappear entirely, because you bought nothing. An old Rolex with papers is worth more than without, but the papers without the Rolex are worth nothing. In this case you're just buying the papers.
  - coralreef 5y ago
    > you're not buying the art. You're not buying the legal rights to the art. You're buying a URL. A signed museum map telling you where you can find art right now. It may in fact just change to different art at some point in the future or disappear entirely, because you bought nothing. Yes, you're starting to get it. You're not buying art, you're not buying legal rights. If the data was written directly to the blockchain, then it is permanent. But even if it points to some temporary host, big deal, the file itself wasn't the valuable part. Data can endlessly be replicated and rehosted. It is the genuine provenance of an artist that was bought and traded. It is proof representing a work, whatever that artist declares it to be. They could simply resell it again for all anyone knows, but that would hurt them and devalue all their future work. All value is abstract. The papers without the Rolex can be worth anything anyone wants to pay for it. Following that rule I suppose fake papers can even be worth something, but most likely not.

chinathrow 5y ago

> NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. Your blockchain will not be there in the future. Permanence? Not so much.

coralreef 5y ago
You have a crystal ball?
- arcticbull 5y ago
  er, do you?
  - coralreef 5y ago
    The Bitcoin network has produced blocks every 10 minutes since January 3 2009 without fail. It is a decentralized network that has faced the test of government, natural disaster, organizational and technical risk, etc. So no, maybe blockchains won't last "forever", but neither of us enough information to confirm either way. My bet is on blockchains outliving everyone typing on this forum.
    - arcticbull 5y ago
      Sounds like we're both speculating then :)
      - coralreef 5y ago
        Sure, if we want to devolve into semantics: NFTs are both worthless and valuable, depending on who you ask.
        arcticbull 5y ago
        That's certainly true

Ekaros 5y ago

I would pay maybe hundred or two hundred for nice indistinguishable replica of Mona Lisa. Not my favourite big, but if it was really really good why not.

Hamuko 5y ago

>NFTs on blockchains solve the problem of provenance and permanence. Except that nothing about the asset is actually stored on a blockchain.

coralreef 5y ago
Other than a signed message publicly associated with a particular entity.