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Comment by usehackernews | Hacker News Reader

Why do people on HN assume that if they don’t find something valuable, others shouldn’t either.

I think of NFTs like car titles.

Having the car title in your name is the only way to prove you own a car. Someone can burrow your car, and have it in their possession but that doesn’t make them the owner - the title does. When you buy a car, what you’re really buying is a little paper that says you’re the owner - without it, you’re just renting.

NFTs work the same but for digital items. When you buy an NFT, you’re really buying the title for that artwork. Sure, people can copy and paste a JPEG, but they can’t take the title from you - Just like possesing a car without a title doesn’t make you the owner.

The concept of an NFT isn’t absurd, it’s a digital version of a real world use case we all rely on daily to prove ownership.

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> Sure, people can copy and paste a JPEG, but they can’t copy the title. Just like driving a friends car doesn’t make you the owner.

This is exactly why NFTs are different to a car title. If someone tries to use your car (the car which you have the title to) without your permission, then the police can intervene. (They often won't, but that's the principle.) In theory at least, they have no right to make use of that object.

If I own the NFT for a JPEG, there's nothing I can do to stop someone copying it, as you say. Not even an ineffective or theoretical method. That's just not part of the rights associated with an NFT to begin with.

In fact it's worse than that. The JPEG (or the image it represents) can still have copyright that someone can own and sell on independently of the NFT. That copyright is the actual analogue of a car title (though enforcement by the police is even less likely). You could have a NFT of a JPEG but not be allowed, in theory, to have a copy the JPEG itself!

It's absurd because if you have a car, someone else doesn't have a car, and the car has intrinsic usefulness. Having the car in your name isn't valuable in and of itself; it's valuable because it allows you to claim the car as your own, and the car is useful and can only be moved, not copied.

Having a JPEG as your own isn't valuable, because JPEGs can be infinitely copied at zero cost. The title for the artwork doesn't mean anything when anyone can duplicate it.

If you want to spend money on art, why not commission some artwork from your favorite artist instead of throwing away money on procedurally generated garbage with a zillion transaction fees tacked on? At least that way the artwork might be something unique to you with a personal significance which makes it have more intrinsic value to you than it would to someone else.

It's more about the token than the JPEG. Gated experiences, communities, in-game items, in-game art, etc is the driving force. And for digitally-native art, there's never been a better way to sell/trade it while preserving provenance.

People are betting on the fact that we'll spend more and more of our time in digital spaces, and I don't think that's necessarily a bad bet.

> Gated experiences, communities, in-game items, in-game art, etc is the driving force.

It is incredibly sad that anyone is working towards a future where a post-scarcity space is fully subdued by artificial scarcity.

Agree to disagree- I think the incentives are better aligned for creators and it will create a much more vibrant digital space.

> Gated experiences, communities, in-game items, in-game art, etc is the driving force. And for digitally-native art, there's never been a better way to sell/trade it while preserving provenance.

It's a bunch of unnecessary synthetic scarcity. What the fuck is good about that? Why do you want to sign on to a model where you're going to be nickel and dimed for everything you see?

As a consumer why do you want to pay for things that have zero marginal cost? What value do you get for buying an NFT to an image or virtual item that costs nothing to reproduce? You're not buying the copyright or any exclusive license to the things.

Why would anyone ever buy an "experience" NFT for something they didn't experience? So they can be known to be a poser and a sucker so long as the blockchain exists?

NFTs are just a way to enforce a class system in a virtual environment where there's no inherent system of haves and have-nots. Not only that but it's a system where an infinitude of intermediaries can extract payment out of any secondary market. It's sad that you're excited to participate in such needless rent seeking.

> What the fuck is good about that?

I think it's more an economic incentive for digital creators who have historically been nickel and dimed every step of the way trying to monetize their work.

> As a consumer why do you want to pay for things that have zero marginal cost?

The value for a consumer is less about paying and more about earning (which sounds dystopic to some, but is very exciting imo). And beyond that, layered experiences mean you could get an item / art / skin / etc and carry it through disparate digital worlds. One could imagine a world where no longer are you playing one game with one set of items, but are instead able to carry your stuff into multiple experiences.

Another point here: NFTs don't have to come into existance through some payment. E.g. playing an MMO and boss drops are NFTs, or by watching some sports game you're given an NFT (or in that case more correctly referred to as a POAP (Proof of Attendance Protocol)). This likely has no monetary value, but is more a social signalling device to show you care about something / did something in the past.

> Why would anyone ever buy an "experience" NFT for something they didn't experience?

Here I'm referring to digital experiences like concerts, parties, tours, AMAs, etc. where there is some set of rules to obtain the entry pass (in NFT form).

> NFTs are just a way to enforce a class system in a virtual environment where there's no inherent system of haves and have-nots

If people could altruistically create high-quality content and earn a living that way I'd agree with you. But, as we've seen with microtransactions, the model is changing as the world spends more and more time in digital 'spaces.' There is value in paying creators, and you're welcome to not participate if this isn't your cup of tea

Overall I think we're coming into this with different images of the future- agree to disagree and I hope it's less dystopic than it could be.

> The value for a consumer is less about paying and more about earning (which sounds dystopic to some, but is very exciting imo). And beyond that, layered experiences mean you could get an item / art / skin / etc and carry it through disparate digital worlds. One could imagine a world where no longer are you playing one game with one set of items, but are instead able to carry your stuff into multiple experiences.

This comes up all the time and is laughably naïve. What possible reason would Epic have to let you transfer a skin or player model to their game if you didn't pay them for it? Game DLC is already broken and consumer hostile. Assuming blockchains and NFTs will do anything to improve it is absurd.

> Here I'm referring to digital experiences like concerts, parties, tours, AMAs, etc. where there is some set of rules to obtain the entry pass (in NFT form).

An NFT has no utility here. Where's the secondary market of suckers wanting to buy an NFT for a thing they didn't experience? If there's no suckers further down the pyramid there's no point in an NFT. It's just an event ticket.

> If people could altruistically create high-quality content and earn a living that way I'd agree with you.

This is the core problem. You're positing a world where every system for some reason cares about things on some blockchain. You're trying to treat an entry on a blockchain like real physical ownership. All this does is port inequality and inequity to a virtual space where it does not naturally exist. Scarcity is not a sine qua non of virtual spaces.

That's just a recipe for a hypercapitalist exploitive hellscape. Join the metaverse! You'll be just as poor as in real life! Join the fun!

> I think it's more an economic incentive for digital creators

I don't understand. NFTs are not hooked up to the legal system of copyright, so how is it ensured that the "digital creators" are the ones that are rewarded? If you create an amazing image, what is to stop me getting the original NFT (by doing something like mining it? sorry I'm not familiar with the terminology) before you do and selling that on without rewarding you? Or, even if you did make the NFT first, what's to stop me altering one pixel or some irrelevant metadata of the image to allow a district NFT being created and selling that instead?

Another commenter said that NFTs are (sometimes? usually? always?) not even derived from the work itself but simply some URL that points at it. That crazy! What's to stop me making another URL for the same work (either hosting it separately or just redirecting to your URL) and making an NFT for that? What if my hosted version outlives yours? The whole idea is so totally ludicrous that I don't see how it's gotten this far.

Unless there's something huge I'm missing (which I'll admit is possible), it's obvious that NFTs are totally useless for this goal of rewarding digital creators. Traditional copyright, while flawed, at least makes an attempt at rewarding the creator of the actual work.

So the driving force for the decentralized piece of tech is centralized tech?

> When you buy an NFT, you’re really buying the title for that artwork.

You're not necessarily, though. When Jack Dorsey sold his first tweet as a NFT, it didn't infer any actual ownership rights. You couldn't even make him delete it.

A car's title holds specific legal weight. The only way NFTs do is if there's a contract, at which point you don't need the NFT anyways.

When you get a title from the real DMV, it's backed by a lot of mutually reinforcing real power. A group of kids can get together and play DMV, issuing titles to each other in crayon on notebook paper. In both cases there is only meaning by consensus, but NFTs sure seem much, much closer to the kids playing.

Everybody except a few conspiracy nuts believe a title is what it is supposed to be. Your friends and neighbors, your parents, the government, the courts, law enforcement, car dealers… but the only people who believe NFTs are what they are supposed to be are insiders.

No - when you buy a house - you also are "buying a title". That's not why people buy houses or cars. They buy them to use & own them.

Maybe Ultra High Net Worth Individuals who collect cars and $10M lakefront mansions across the world don't buy cars and houses to "use" them. But >99% of cars and houses are bought for use - not for a piece of paper to prove ownership.

Sure - the people buying $1M NFTs are probably Ultra High Net Worth Individuals (or complete frauds - maybe both?). But the majority of NFTs are not $1M - and the majority of people buying them are not Ultra High Net Worth Individuals.

People definitely buy real estate for the resale value.

Right, but the use value (both for primary homeowners and for, Allah forgive me for using this word, landlords) stands as a backstop to the resale value of real estate.

Owning a car vs. renting one allows me to keep it in my garage indefinitely.

If I try to keep in my garage without the ownership title, the police will come, take the car, give it to the owner, and put me in jail.

What does owning a NFT of a JPEG allow me to do that I cannot do with just a saved copy of the JPEG on my hard disk? (Selling the NFT itself doesn't count, for obvious reasons.)

The legitimacy of a car title is backed by a government agency. What legal entity backs an NFT? To what authority do you go to enforce your ownership of a JPEG if there is a dispute? Will courts recognize an NFT in a case of disputed ownership?

The car title is analogous to owning the copyright or trademark on an image - something that actually confers meaningful legal power over it.

The NFT is more like a car enthusiast club issuing stickers or badges to its members.

When you buy an NFT, you're really buying an NFT and not the artwork. It's like the opposite of a car title.

The absurd part would be that there are multiple registries, so more than one person can own the same NFT since they are on different systems. Which one is used to prove ownership? The one backed by entity A or the one backed by entity B?

P.S. I find value in this tech but it is still in primitive phase in my perspective.

When you buy the car you own the car. When you buy the NFT you typically own the title but not the car.

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