Hey MJ & co. Why Is "Everyone Doing It" On NFTs? Is It The Real Deal?

[MTF]

Agree, I could go find and sell you a few acres of land that is worthless. No utilities, limited access, no supporting local population, and too small to actually do anything productive with besides park a trailer on. Until someone has an idea to improve the land its intrinsic value is nothing. So the theory that there is no more land being made so the value always goes up does not hold true.

You can always grow food on it. Or live there in a tent or whatever. There's always some value. Of course, you can improve it more in some more capitalistic way, but the starting point already gives it value.

There's no value in NFTs other than speculative value. You can't improve it. You can't use it for anything. I'm not saying it does NOT have value and don't want to argue that point. Just saying that ultimately it's a 100% virtual thing that has no use whatsoever.

A physical painting has decorative value. You can see it, touch it, display it. Or you can burn it lol. NFT has no purpose. Unless you print that JPG (but you don't have to buy it for that).

In the end, I don't care if people want to spend their money on this. Ultimately, we all make investment decisions based on our personal experiences and values. People into art may be super excited to be able to support their favorite artists without the problems associated with storing physical art.

 

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[csalvato]

In the end, I don't care if people want to spend their money on this.

As an entrepreneur who creates digital art in the form of the written word, I would think you would care deeply about people spending money on this.

 

[MTF]

As an entrepreneur who creates digital art in the form of the written word, I would think you would care deeply about people spending money on this.

I primarily sell information for a few bucks per book. So I don't really consider it digital art. I'm merely saving people time by offering a book with information they could possibly find elsewhere but would spend a lot of time doing it.

Also, my brand is nothing compared to celebrities in the art world. So NFTs are not valuable to me at all because nobody would pay for them. I published a physical book that could be considered more of a "collectible" and it failed miserably.

Or maybe I don't believe in my work enough to believe that someone would spend a considerable amount of money to buy a file they can buy on Amazon for a few bucks.

Either way, I wouldn't feel okay selling something I don't believe has value. I appreciate the new opportunities for the right people but it's not for me.

 

[csalvato]

Either way, I wouldn't feel okay selling something I don't believe has value. I appreciate the new opportunities for the right people but it's not for me.

I think it's less about where the technology is right now (collectibles), and more about where it is going (creator-controlled rights management for digital property).

Smart contracts already exist where you can issue out the NFT and collect royalties on it, no matter where or how it is sold or consumed.

This is an existential threat to all self publishing platforms that specialize in digital books, like Amazon's CreateSpace or Audible, and, IMO, is an opportunity in which you might be able to capitalize.

Maybe not this year or next, but there's a very high probability that over the next 5-10 years your industry (along with the music and film industry) will be run mostly on NFTs, rather than centralized services like CreateSpace or middleman businesses like record labels.

I'm not criticizing you or forcing you to do anything – just providing food for thought to someone who I know feeds his brain.

 

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[MaxKhalus]

You’re missing the bigger picture here.

Look into EulerBeats to see the possibilities of future NFT applications that leverage automatic royalties and instill a minimum floor on the buyout price of the collectible.

Like the internet, BTC and mobile apps, this isn’t a wave you want to miss because you “don’t get it”. Not as an investor, but as an entrepreneur.

Scenario: You are ultra wealthy (100M+ in net worth). You see the government printing like crazy and want to get out of fiat. Where do you put your money?

There are many options for you. More than the average person because you have so much money.

One such avenue is collectibles. The highly priced ones go up in value and often they are cheap to store (think of buying a huge rare diamond that fits in a small display case, or a Picasso that just takes up some space on the wall).

The value should appreciate over time because it is a highly valued and rare collectible. It also gives you status that you own something rare and only you own it.

And you just protected your dollars.

This is one scenario for why collectibles get snatched up at super high prices. Most people don’t understand it because they are not ultra rich and never put themselves in those shoes.

Collectibles of all kinds are soaring right now, not just NFTs. For the ultra rich, an NFT is even more attractive since it takes no space to store it, and displaying it is cheap and easy if you want to..both physically and in virtual worlds like DCL and Twitter

That's the explanation I was looking for, so thx. Couple questions:
- If I'm ultra rich and own an NFT, can I go and sell it at the bank or exchange? (at the floor price)
- How do NFTs relate to trademarks? It makes sense to buy both since it protects your commercial rights. It could be a way of getting that NFT out of the platform to the real world

If so, NFTs seem to have great value for protecting creator's media.

What I don't get is, why would anyone pay for it more than the production cost? Why does Mona Lisa cost millions besides rarity? Why one brand sells higher, even when a nobody may have a better product to sell?

Is it because of branding, the creator's story?

 

[MaxKhalus]

(Duplicated)

 

[MaxKhalus]

Value is built when you have something someone else wants. Nothing is intrinsically valuable.

The concept of intrinsic value is a myth/narrative too many people have bought into through their life because of the status quo.

I think the higher level lesson in 2020-2021 that I have been seeing a lot of people miss is what it means for something to have value.

Going back to the concept of "intrinsic value" is an easy answer as to why a lot of stuff has no value.

And if one just accepts that answer, I believe they are missing the bigger trend that's going on: people are re-learning what "value" really means, and that there's no such thing as intrinsic value.

Value is solely a function of how much someone else that thing you have, and the number of options they have to secure that thing.

So you would say your definition of value equals the definition that appears on MJ Books?

Value meant to me that something required physical resources or time. While NFTs are limited, you can create another NFT anytime.

The question then becomes, How do you know what NFTs are valuable when there's thousands, millions potentially in a few years from now?

Apparently, who creates it has something to do with that. Go watch the NFT song Elon Released:

View: https://youtu.be/lP2_2-TY1_k

Video

So the way you "invest" goes like this:
- Subscribe to every NFT seller on Twitter with decent following
- Buy the first thing they release as long as it's under $100 (floor price) including ETH
- You'll eventually sell it for 2x minimum. Possibly the same week.

Seems legit.

So yeah, no doubt these NFTs will be huge. In 5 years or so, for what I've heard.

 

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[csalvato]

- If I'm ultra rich and own an NFT, can I go and sell it at the bank or exchange? (at the floor price)

To be clear most NFTs do not have a guaranteed floor price in the way EulerBeats does.

How EulerBeats implemented a guaranteed floor price is very interesting, though, and I can see more novel approaches to minting and managing NFTs that build on their basic concepts.

In the case of EulerBeats, the floor price can be achieved by clicking on button and getting a deposit of ETH into your account via the smart contract (no centralized services are necessary).

If you're ultra rich and own an NFT that's simply a piece of art as a collectible, then you sell it the same way you would sell any other collectible - by putting it on the market up for sale and hoping someone values that piece for as much as you did, or, ideally, more.

With traditional collectibles, the marketplace is very obscure and hidden. You need to use auction houses like Christies to see pieces and have a dealer put together a price history for you.

With NFTs, digital marketplaces make it very easy to buy and sell when compared to regular collectibles. But they are more illiquid than a fungible asset like BTC, USD or Tesla stock.

- How do NFTs relate to trademarks? It makes sense to buy both since it protects your commercial rights. It could be a way of getting that NFT out of the platform to the real world

If so, NFTs seem to have great value for protecting creator's media.

Trademarks and copyrights are enforceable by law. NFTs are not.

NFTs ensure you have a single copy of that one token. Trademarks and copyrights ensure that if someone uses your work outside the bounds of the law, you can take legal action.

In the near term, I believe it makes sense to get patents, trademarks and copyrights for things stored on NFTs, though you'd likely want to ask an NFT artist about that rather than me.

In the distant future, I believe trademarks, patents and copyrights will be managed by NFTs on a blockchain of some sort.

What I don't get is, why would anyone pay for it more than the production cost? Why does Mona Lisa cost millions besides rarity? Why one brand sells higher, even when a nobody may have a better product to sell?

Because someone wants it for that price. And one thing 2020-2021 has taught us is that, more than anything, it's about the story and narrative you can craft.

This was always true with collectibles, but in 2020-2021 we have seen humans reduced to their most basic elements when they buy and sell - because I want it and you have it.

 

[HelpAndProsper]

NFTs created a way for digital items to be uniquely identifiable.

Compare it to me printing a Picasso on my HP printer at home vs a true original Picasso.

One is worth millions, the other one is worth the price of a piece of paper.

Now digital assets can be impossible to counterfeit. Sure, you can screenshot a picture online.. but it is not the original so it has no value.

Counterfeiting IRL is really advanced and can be indistinguishable unless examined by the highest level of experts. And even they can be fooled. This takes human error out of the equation.

I agree. The miracle of NFTs and Blockchain in general is that now we have 'scarcity' built into digital form.
There were only so many Mickey Mantle baseball cards printed.

Now, with NFTs, you can decide there will only be so many digital copies of your art digitally available.

Even more brilliant, every time that one piece of digital art is sold in the future, the original artist gets a certain percentage cut on every sale in the future.

Amazing....

 

[csalvato]

So you would say your definition of value equals the definition that appears on MJ Books?

Value meant to me that something required physical resources or time. While NFTs are limited, you can create another NFT anytime.

The question then becomes, How do you know what NFTs are valuable when there's thousands, millions potentially in a few years from now?

I don't know the definition of value that MJ has in his books off the top of my head, but I would be surprised if the two definitions weren't aligned.

Value does not require physical resources or time.

If I have information about where your child is being held captive, that information is very valuable to you.

It didn't take any physical resource to generate nor did it take me much time aside from hearing where that child has been held captive.

Value typically correlates with resources and time, but it's not a strict necessity. All that's necessary is that someone else has what you want and you're willing to pay for it to obtain it.

 

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[Sethamus]

You can always grow food on it. Or live there in a tent or whatever. There's always some value. Of course, you can improve it more in some more capitalistic way, but the starting point already gives it value.

There's no value in NFTs other than speculative value. You can't improve it. You can't use it for anything. I'm not saying it does NOT have value and don't want to argue that point. Just saying that ultimately it's a 100% virtual thing that has no use whatsoever.

A physical painting has decorative value. You can see it, touch it, display it. Or you can burn it lol. NFT has no purpose. Unless you print that JPG (but you don't have to buy it for that).

In the end, I don't care if people want to spend their money on this. Ultimately, we all make investment decisions based on our personal experiences and values. People into art may be super excited to be able to support their favorite artists without the problems associated with storing physical art.

Well let me know, I’ll go acquire some cheap land out west and sell it to you to start a farm. Disclaimer: land will have no water sources, very little annual rainfall and mostly clay soil so a great deal of money will be needed to make it fertile, but don’t worry it is still valuable

 

[MaxKhalus]

I don't know the definition of value that MJ has in his books off the top of my head, but I would be surprised if the two definitions weren't aligned.

Value does not require physical resources or time.

If I have information about where your child is being held captive, that information is very valuable to you.

It didn't take any physical resource to generate nor did it take me much time aside from hearing where that child has been held captive.

Value typically correlates with resources and time, but it's not a strict necessity. All that's necessary is that someone else has what you want and you're willing to pay for it to obtain it.

Got it.
Any resources/books/channels you recommend to learn about branding? Because it's probably the next thing I want to research. For business, not just NFTs.

 

[MTF]

I think it's less about where the technology is right now (collectibles), and more about where it is going (creator-controlled rights management for digital property).

Smart contracts already exist where you can issue out the NFT and collect royalties on it, no matter where or how it is sold or consumed.

This is an existential threat to all self publishing platforms that specialize in digital books, like Amazon's CreateSpace or Audible, and, IMO, is an opportunity in which you might be able to capitalize.

Maybe not this year or next, but there's a very high probability that over the next 5-10 years your industry (along with the music and film industry) will be run mostly on NFTs, rather than centralized services like CreateSpace or middleman businesses like record labels.

I'm not criticizing you or forcing you to do anything – just providing food for thought to someone who I know feeds his brain.

Yeah there's at least one company already:

Bookchain®

www.bookchain.ca

I've never used it and it seems a little amateurish with that design. But here's a conversation with the CEO and he seems to know his stuff:

Copyright Protection, Smart Contracts, Digital Scarcity and NFTs for Authors. Blockchain For The Publishing Industry With Simon-Pierre Marion

Blockchain technology offers exciting opportunities for authors & publishing including copyright protection, smart contracts, digital scarcity and NFTs for authors, as well as estate management.

www.thecreativepenn.com

 

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[csalvato]

Got it.
Any resources/books/channels you recommend to learn about branding? Because it's probably the next thing I want to research. For business, not just NFTs.

I'm probably not the best person to ask about branding.

I enjoyed the book Brand Sense and Pitch Anything, but wouldn't consider myself an expert on brand building.

 

[Art777]

I watched some of Alex Becker's videos on NFTs, but I ignore them now. Honestly 99% people should go back to work and forget about this. The only ones who should invest are people who appreciate digital art (creative/collector types) with money and time to spare.

Otherwise this seems like a massive waste of time, especially for people with businesses.

 

[F Wings]

I agree. The miracle of NFTs and Blockchain in general is that now we have 'scarcity' built into digital form.
There were only so many Mickey Mantle baseball cards printed.

Now, with NFTs, you can decide there will only be so many digital copies of your art digitally available.

Even more brilliant, every time that one piece of digital art is sold in the future, the original artist gets a certain percentage cut on every sale in the future.

Amazing....

See, this just doesn't add up. There is a very clear difference between physical and digital art, in that even thought it's possible to make 99.99% copy of the Mona Lisa, it's never the exact same thing. But that's just the difference between digital and physical: I could easily screenshot any of these NFT's and it would be a 100% copy and that copy could be copied billion times without any effort. And besides, if you have an NFT in your wallet most of the time it's not the art that you have in your possession , but a for example a web address to the digital art because the block sizes simply aren't big enough to hold more than a smidge of information, couple kb's if I remember correctly.

 

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[csalvato]

See, this just doesn't add up. There is a very clear difference between physical and digital art, in that even thought it's possible to make 99.99% copy of the Mona Lisa, it's never the exact same thing. But that's just the difference between digital and physical: I could easily screenshot any of these NFT's and it would be a 100% copy and that copy could be copied billion times without any effort. And besides, if you have an NFT in your wallet most of the time it doesn't even reside in there, but a for example a web address to the digital art because the block sizes simply aren't big enough to hold more than a smidge of information, couple kb's if I remember correctly.

You need to go a few levels deeper to have this click, I think.

The Mona Lisa was painted by DaVinci and has a story around that. An NFT made by Beeple has a similar story, even if a complete copy of the underlying art is made.

You're right: NFTs content are not stored directly in the blockchain. They are also not stored in web addresses either, because that would defeat the purpose of owning an NFT.

Instead, most large NFT content that is stored on the IPFS which looks up content by the content itself, not some location on a server somewhere. It's a completely different paradigm.

 

[MaxKhalus]

You need to go a few levels deeper to have this click, I think.

The Mona Lisa was painted by DaVinci and has a story around that. An NFT made by Beeple has a similar story, even if a complete copy of the underlying art is made.

You're right: NFTs content are not stored directly in the blockchain. They are also not stored in web addresses either, because that would defeat the purpose of owning an NFT.

Instead, most large NFT content that is stored on the IPFS which looks up content by the content itself, not some location on a server somewhere. It's a completely different paradigm.

Hey, I've thought about it a little bit and came to this conclusion:
- People often want to buy the best product, not second options
- If you're the best (product quality, stories, reputation), competition doesn't matter
- Because you're "the only one" selling it, you monopolize and charge as much as you want. Or as much as people will pay.

If this logic makes sense, how would you translate that into NFTs?

Perhaps it's about the best artists, cryptocurrencies, and so on.

So there IS money to be made before these top-performers explode in value. But by definition, that could mean that the large majority of alternatives may be worthless.

 

[csalvato]

So there IS money to be made before these top-performers explode in value. But by definition, that could mean that the large majority of alternatives may be worthless.

When it comes to NFT collectibles, I believe that's what we will see.

Most NFTs will go to 0, just as most baseball cards are worthless, except for the ones that are highly sought after, like a Mickey Mantle rookie card.

Hey, I've thought about it a little bit and came to this conclusion:
- People often want to buy the best product, not second options
- If you're the best (product quality, stories, reputation), competition doesn't matter
- Because you're "the only one" selling it, you monopolize and charge as much as you want. Or as much as people will pay.

If this logic makes sense, how would you translate that into NFTs?

You've just described how collectibles have worked for thousands of years...the only difference with NFTs is that there is a new way to create unique collectibles, and there are more sophisticated rules that can be built in around resale and consumption of the content.

 

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[maverick]

We are at the very, very beginning of blockchain technology starting to move into mainstream applications.

Yes, there is a lot of speculation going on.
Yes, there are a lot of fools that are throwing their money around in anything they can find.
No, not everything will m00n or make you rich while you sleep.

But fools throwing their money around at anything blockchain related are just as bad as people that dismiss the technology straight out by spouting the old media chestnut: "TULIP MANIA".

Imagine being able to tokenise ownership of real estate. That by itself will eliminate a bunch of overhead/paperwork (e.g. in the near future notaries will be like travel agencies; extinct).

 

[MA81]

 

[BlackPebbles]

Only the first ones matter, like the first cryptocurrency. These things are only important because they’re early and at some point in the future when they are ubiquitous someone will go wow look at this million dollar NFT of the first tweet. But we will probably be dead by then so ... shrug. Hardly bears railing against. It’s like getting upset about baseball cards.

 

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[mr4ffe]

Maybe it'll be possible to trade web domains in the form of NFT's in the future?
I know NFT's could be used for stock photos/videos, too.
Maybe beats, as well.

 

[dollars]

For the record, cryptocurrency doing these kind of things have been around since Ethereum first started (so many many years at this point). Why is it picking up now? I don't know. When I heard about NFTs I did some research and saw people talking about crypto to verify things (such as if a Gucci bag is fake or not) as if it was new technology. This new hype is entirely fomo imo. It doesn't mean you can't make money, but anybody comparing something digital (which can be copied pixel for pixel) with the difference between a Chinese Gucci wallet and a legitimate Gucci wallet is falling for the hype. The better comparison would be the difference between owning a pirated movie and a real copy of the movie. Assuming both movies are exactly the same (same quality, same pixel by pixel movie), then do you think people would pay more money for one? The funny thing is that yes, some people would. But that would likely be due to convenience or other variables (maybe wanting to support the creator, or just not knowing how to pirate), rather than the quality of the movie itself.

 

[BlackPebbles]

Hands up who owns cryptokitties they can no longer access The technology moved on and I can’t get in even with my seed phrase. I wonder how people will feel over their fancy works when that happens. Lesson is, check on your shit.

 

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[MaxKhalus]

that would likely be due to convenience or other variables (maybe wanting to support the creator, or just not knowing how to pirate), rather than the quality of the movie itself

That's the most likely.

Imagine you're buying a copy with the same quality. You might get it cheaper, but you're still reinforcing the image of the original.

When people see a copy, they think of the original.

For brands, that's free advertising.

Maybe something similar happens with NFTs. Some guys are reselling Beeple's "duplicates" for cheaper, which only raises the price of the original.

One targets status customers, another targets cheap customers.

 

[dollars]

Mark Cuban sold an NFT last week. A jpg picture of a quote. Someone bought it for ~$1600. Nothing physical was exchanged.

Mintable.app

Mintable.app - The best marketplace for artists and sellers of digital items. Private, unlimited, files on the Ethereum blockchain

mintable.app

 

[PratLey]

I haven't found this thread in the Forum, and I'm sure many more will ask it again, so here it goes:

No matter what career you have, you'll have probably stumbled with crypto and NFTs. Because they're everywhere, from Gary Vee's channel to Google News.

With curiosity, I started and learned about the pros and cons of this currency. I'm not a fan of art/collecting, but for what I've learned, NFTs are an inflated version of that (easier/faster trade of non-fungible tokens).

Almost every day, I see bordeline ridiculous headlines...

Nothing wrong with that. I just can't make sense of it, and how it fits the productocracy. And everything you can find in both MJs books.

Are NFTs the real deal?

Two conflicts I see:
1. "Everyone is doing it." Everyone is buying because they believe that someone else will buy. (Ponzi connotation)
2. It has no intrinsic value

And yes, you could say that money itself doesn't have intrinsic value either.

In short, I know what NFTs are, pros and cons. I don't know why they exist or they should be worth anything.

P.S. Not asking for investment advice.

NFT is bubble and soon it going to burst but it is like internet in early days like Dotcom bubble nobody has knowledge people are building arts and creating NFT. NFT is money making opportunity for celebraties, famous personalities to sell their own unique signature, painting etc. Just like founder of twitter selling his first tweet.
NFT has great potential in different field rather than just selling arts,jpg,MP3 etc. Fields like identity card or use as a agreement or bill when you bought house but digitally not paper.

 

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[Kevin88660]

I haven't found this thread in the Forum, and I'm sure many more will ask it again, so here it goes:

No matter what career you have, you'll have probably stumbled with crypto and NFTs. Because they're everywhere, from Gary Vee's channel to Google News.

With curiosity, I started and learned about the pros and cons of this currency. I'm not a fan of art/collecting, but for what I've learned, NFTs are an inflated version of that (easier/faster trade of non-fungible tokens).

Almost every day, I see bordeline ridiculous headlines...

Nothing wrong with that. I just can't make sense of it, and how it fits the productocracy. And everything you can find in both MJs books.

Are NFTs the real deal?

Two conflicts I see:
1. "Everyone is doing it." Everyone is buying because they believe that someone else will buy. (Ponzi connotation)
2. It has no intrinsic value

And yes, you could say that money itself doesn't have intrinsic value either.

In short, I know what NFTs are, pros and cons. I don't know why they exist or they should be worth anything.

P.S. Not asking for investment advice.

It is very illiquid and most works will have no bid.

The extreme price chasing the top few pieces is driven by crypto early adopters to flex their wealth.

The media is exaggerating to make it look “easy and silly”.

There could be tax purposes for a lot of crypto investors in these deals.

 

[CasualFriday]

The way I see it is the hype of crypto (furthered by crypto enthusiasts) with the borderline absurdity of the art market where true value is nearly impossible to determine/argue. And the price is essentially a function of scarcity and social perception. Plus of the narrative that art has traditionally been used as an investment vehicle, although I think what we’re seeing now is closer to the dot com bubble where anything ending in a dot com was overvalued and once the hype died down everyone came to the realization that only a few of those companies (or in this case art pieces) were actually worth anything in the long run. I recently made a video talking about NFTs and the art market that goes more in-depth, but this is the generalized, broad version of it.