bloomberg Publish in bulk A 40,000-word story about crypto Tuesday by veteran financial journalist Matt Levine.In that work, Levine derisively writes NFTslikening them and much of the crypto space to Ponzi schemes.
“To put it bluntly, all web3 projects are Ponzi at the same time. [scheme]’ Levine writes, arguing that most tokens are bought with the express purpose of offloading them to others to get more money. Do you think they will buy the product because you think they will like it or because you think they will? they Planning to get rich by selling to bigger suckers? Where does it end?
When Levine specifically wrote about the existence of NFTs in the larger Web3 context, he made several points that underpinned his belief in the intrinsic worthlessness of NFTs. Worried, thin, and the general sentiment expressed by art NFTs was exactly that for “Zombies and Kittens.”
NFTs have obvious technical and legal issues. The basic thing that Levine brought up was, in his words, “art doesn’t exist on the blockchain.”
“When you buy an NFT, what you own is a notation on the blockchain that says you own a pointer to a web server. probably A picture of a monkey, but that’s not blockchain’s job. ”
There are many NFTs where art appears, teeth For example, NFTs created on the generative art platform Art Blocks are held on the blockchain, while the majority of NFTs are not.
Kehlani NicoleSince 2013, he has been operating the digital art gallery Transfer. Said art news past the year she got annoyed That most people didn’t know this. “NFTs are just one of the display assets available online. They are public and receipts,” said Nichol. “But to really own the work, you have to get the full archive his package.”
What is her point? Buying tokens is not enough to own and control digital artwork.
What Levine didn’t mention is that even the royalties supposedly guaranteed to the artist by the NFT not always delivered This is because different NFT marketplaces create different smart contracts that cannot be processed when NFTs are sold across platforms.
Things get even worse when it comes to legal matters.
The technical and legal ties between blockchain and JPEG and ownership are a bit thin,” Levine wrote, continuing to say that these ties are only culturally enforced.
Last year, intellectual property attorney Jeff Gluck Said art news“I walked into the courtroom and said, ‘I put this on the blockchain. [as proof of ownership].”
what teeth Copyright is recognized. But what if the NFT is not copyrighted?
Dr. Andres Guadamuz, a leading expert on the intersection of intellectual property rights and the developing field of cryptography, says that most NFT collections of profile images are generated images). Likely not subject to copyright protection Under current standards of originality and creativity.
Where Levine didn’t get it was his claim to limit NFTs to large PFP collections of zombies and kittens and use them to defraud money. NFT’s roots lie in his early digital art scene and the efforts of artists to get paid for their work, which was often difficult to sell.
Kevin McCoy, an early inventor of NFTs, said, “We’ve seen the world transform into a world where creative media is very basic networked digital reality. There was no direct way to assess it until . , Said art news.
“As I see it, this Gold Rush or whatever we want to call it is a leveling or rebalancing, taking some of the value that has been so close to the creative community that has delivered it. I am moving it.”
But McCoy was also aware of the abuses and tones of the community, commenting that the sustained use of NFTs is a result of people willing to shape a better space. Art collectors go crazy.
