NFT and the Future of Digital Content
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Well this thing seems to have blown over and it's business per usual, which was very much expected. I've taken the steps that are available to me, pulled my CC info, changed my bookmarks so I don't need to see the store front page, unsuscribed to the newsletters, emptied my wishlist. To each their own...
This must be as irritating for others as it is to me, not only was my comment not posted under the blog but I can't seem to see any other ones. I guess it wasn't 'constructive' enough.
While I do apreciate that DAZ has made some positive changes, I agree that NFTs have no business being on this site. I am not at the point of refusing to shop here, but I have deleted 40% of my wishlist and will probably trim it even more. I have also been buying more from Renderosity.
They should just remove the comments section from the blog.
Same. Too bad.
...I also deleted my gallery.
It's now two weeks + 1 day that DAZ is pushing NFT. Did they actually sell anything?
Their activity lists 10 sales
I hope it was everything they hoped it was. If they gained there, they lost customers here...maybe it evens out ;)
I noticed that too. NFT on Daz will soon belong to history. Just my two cents on this irritating and unnecessary move.
Whoa, it's not a contract. It's just a token with a unique ID and some metadata, usually a hyperlink to a digital artwork, that records transaction history, nothing more. It only validates itself and it's transaction history. No one here thinks it's an art format, we've covered the fact the art isn't on the blockchain and buyers don't own the art (just the token, and multiple "unique" tokens may exist) dozens of times. In theory it could potentially have other parameters in the metadata that could serve contract like functions, but there's no special legal enforcement on that kind of thing, and if there were, how would it be any better than a paper contract? You'd still want a lawyer to analyze or write the terms in any contractual NFT that you wouldn't trust yourself to write for your own paper contract or sign. Any type of contract that needs to be officiated by a witness or official would still need that to verify the account owner is completing the "transaction". So a $150 minting fee (someone said it was up to $150 now) + lawyer fees? Paper contracts seem smarter.
However, even if it did work that way, this conversation is mostly about NFTs and art, so they're just hyperlinks with no guarantees of uniqueness (except the token itself), ownership (except the token itself), rights to anything (except the token itself), and there's no guarantee the seller is the creator (or bought it from the creator) and unlike regular content marketplaces, these ones usually don't care if the minter has rights to the work or not. But sure, the TOKEN is unique and buyers will be the sole owner. Of the token, not the artwork. I know it's just a hypothetical value, but really a $7 NFT sale would put you in the red since you have to pay A LOT more than that upfront to mint them. The ability for creators minters to earn money on resale has some benefit, but unless it accrues significantly more value in this crowded market, the artist is better off selling any copies of their work to buyers directly for full price . Plus then buyers receive an actual product not a token that may or may not point to that product.
My gumroad receipts prove I bought content on gumroad, no lawyers needed. I bet it even has a unique order number. (As did my Daz receipts, back in the days before NFTs on Daz). I can't resell the files, but I could charge people money then email them my receipt, which is all they'd get with the NFT anyway. No one would buy it, because that would be dumb. The only benefit over regular digital marketplaces to buyers is maybe potential resellibility.
But if it's just a resellable commodity to buyers, there are physical artworks and collectibles that make far more sense for investment. For high end stuff you get provenance AND the artwork or item. Fancy. Selling a physical artwork or item with an NFT on an environmentally responsible blockchain to prove provenance might be one of the few sensible uses for them, but that's not what they're doing now. Instead you just get hyperlinks to works anyone can enjoy and you only own the unique token, but other "unique" tokens may point to the same file or copies thereof. it's like buying provenance papers without buying the artwork, with the possibility the provenance papers are fake, but a guarantee they're unique provenance papers and continually updated. People want NFT pointers to artwork to be special because they're fancy new tech and trendy, but as implemented they are incapable of doing what they were designed to do, even the creators themselves say this.
I touched on this earlier in the thread, but the total buy-in + making it a fixture of the site + backlash and lack of sales apparently making no difference is what's creeped me out enough to significantly erode my trust in the company.
I know that probably sounds overdramatic to some people, but there's a really timely example on Twitter right now as a well known artist who dislikes NFTs is getting tagged in multiple tweets with almost identical wording, phrased to sound like a casual comment hoping he could be convinced. These tweets aren't directed at the artist, but as replies to an NFT marketplace.
This is bizarre and looks like a (poorly) coordinated attempt to lure him into trying to sell to interested buyers who aren't even real. Almost every artist who does decide to sell NFTs--including Daz--gets hype replies that probably rarely translate to sales, because their actual purpose is to make the seller feel good and be convincingly enthusiastic for onlookers. Daz actually did sell to one of the people who hyped an NFT post--and they were an aspiring crypto marketplace founder themselves.
I do think The Diigitals legitimately didn't know what they were getting into. I think Daz probably did, or has a long-term vision already well in place. They've shown true believer behavior, and that has has way more impact on my willingness to continue spending money here than just selling NFTs does.
I hope I'm wrong? Maybe they've just made commitments in contracts? I know it's easy for well-meant decisions to take on a sinister vibe when they're viewed as the actions of a company and not of an individual. But also it's totally possible for individuals with enough power to treat their personal instincts and values as a company roadmap and hit the gas with entirely misplaced confidence. I would like to know for sure, because I can't buy things from a company that intends to use its platform and resources to try to accelerate the singularity or some other weird cyberpunk thing tech leaders feel like ubergeniuses for LARPing.
It is usually not the people in the trenches that fail a company. It isusually the management layer. Either by not doing enough to stay at the front line of innovation. Or by overdoing it. In my opinion (and I might be completely wrong) the main Daz problem is that they do neither listen nor care for their current customers. Instead of finding sensible ways to extend their customer base, they try to squeeze additional dollars out of the existing customers. And, like dairy farming, you have to listen to the mooh. The mooh at the customer base is quite high already. And, while the alternatives to the Daz store are not that great, this does not have to remain in the future.
Creating bridges to e.g. for Unity is a great idea. This would help, in the long run, to broaden the Daz customer base. NFT''s are not. because the target group is different. I would have expected Daz to do some basic market analysis beforehand. Each and every MBA program I am aware of has a marketing module, and the first thing there is: Who will be your customers? What do they need? What do they want? And how can you serve them BETTER than your competitor?
I suppose that Daz marketing can do a better job than they are doing right now.
Today was earnings day for a couple of big banks, JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs. One thing that came up is that Goldman Sachs, that's one big U.S. bank (okay, really big) has roughly as much in assets under management (USD2.2T) as the entire capitalization of all cryptocurrencies combined. JPMorgan has USD3.7T under management, nearly twice that much. And yet, cryptocurrencies are using all that energy and burning all that fuel and causing all those emissions.
If acceptance of cryptocurrencies increases, its negative effects will increase greatly, while its financial and social benefits will increase marginally, and primarily to those already vested. We've seen an argument about comparing crypto emissions to "the world banking sector" and it's emissions. In reality, a better comparision is between all of crypto and one big bank, that doesn't even have retail branches.
Edit:
Oh, and if anyone's not had enough of NFTs, here's a brief discussion of some legal considerations that may affect NFTs in the near and distant future, including the possibilty of NFTs being regulated like securities, i.e., by the SEC, etc.
I know, most likely, this post will be deleted as DAZ Productions, Inc. does not want a political discourse on a political topic they imposed on their community.
However, NFT is not possible without cryptocurrency, and currency in any way is a "political" thing. And obvíous cryptocurrency the more.
So, I hope the links I now post will not be deleted, as I think they should be considered, especially by every American citizen.
A virtual seminar was recently held by the Richard Nixon Foundation that had cryptocurrency as a topic.
Here are the links:
Coindesk link
Bloomberg
Decrypt
Business Insider link 1
Business Insider link 2
All these links clearly show that cryptocurrency is a political thing. Therefore, NFT is also a political thing - aside from the fact that cryptocurrency and its mining threaten the world climate and humanity's future existence.
It is, and I very much hope Daz takes your post to heart because it's important that they understand, as a business, that this is not a politically neutral choice.
They've made a positive effort to be more inclusive with their products and marketing, which is part of why this came as such an unpleasant surprise to me (although that was naive given that many companies are happy to profit off inclusiveness).
Marginalized people are often deeply invested in the effects of climate change, but it's not because it's cute to be environmentally aware. It's because when fires and floods and freak storms and droughts destroy areas where humans live, there are many, many people who will never recover because there's no help for them and there never has been. Even state help won't account for hundreds or thousands of individuals who will fall through the cracks and never get their lives back.
It's great to have 3D wheelchairs in the store but it's more important to research the technology you back and keep in mind how many people are considered expendable in pursuit of progress that benefits a few. When you take up that tech as a cause and call it the wave of the future, at best you are dismissing concerns from people who are used to being the canary in the coal mine for every "whoops, maybe that had consequences after all" development. I don't understand how people can justify speeding forward on something so pointlessly wasteful in the face of legitimate fears because money might happen without feeling like a cartoon villain. But the effects are inextricable from the ideology and that's why they can't be justified away. You are aligning yourself with people who don't care what happens as long as they profit.
I am not a person who thinks tech barons should be able to become de facto world leaders because they hold too much online infrastructure to make them accountable to laws. If you think this does not sound good either, consider that crypto promotion may not be a good choice for you!
...both posts above, well put.
NFT is still a thing here? I counted it 1 week, tops, given that it imploded BEFORE DAZ ridiculously added it to the storefront.
Apparently so. The link to the NFT page is still given greater priority over the gallery and forums.
Like in politics, getting a bad law revoked is hard because it means admitting someone might have been wrong – or at least hadn’t thought of all the possible consequences.
This is my attempt at some simplistic market analysis for NFTs: I find it difficult to understand the value of an NFT to the buyer. It has been stated that NFT is not copy protection. So the only benefit to the buyer. is "proof" that he or she has the right to own a "legit" copy of a piece of digital art, whether it is the only legit copy, or one of a limited number of copies.
However the proof of legitimacy is in a highly complex and not human readable form that requires expert level understanding of crypto mathematics in order to personally verify. Therefore the buyer must rely on software intervention (to verify the block-chain calculaton) at some point during the transaction, or immediatly after, to provide this proof. This also means the this software will need to be certified as accurate and legit. Or maybe buyers aren't that interested in verifying that they got what they paid for and will just take the seller's word for it. It happens.
Question: Why is all this added complexity better that a simple receipt? Why would anyone pay a premium for this? It's just digital art with an embedded proof of ownership, right? What am I missing?
It's an embedded proof of ownership of a proof of ownership. NFTs aren't about art, digital or otherwise. The other day a single grey pixel sold for USD 1.3 million. NFTs make Andy Warhol's signed dollar bills look like the Sistine Chapel.
I think ownership to me is much more "Can I download this on my computer."
When I get a file, I own it. it's "mine" in the sense I can do as I please in the confines of the file format. NFT is neither. It's a proof the owner vouches for you for having bought a link. Now whether that is worth something to somebody is entirely up for debate, but I think in its current form it just isn't the case.
The intent is that you can buy a token at one price, and sell it later at a higher price. That is the entirety of the goal here, it's not really complicated, people are just making it sound complicated to avoid talking about the purpose of this.
You’re right “it's not really complicated”, but the only “purpose of this” appears to be to have artists pay quite a bit of money for a “token” they may or may not be able to sell for enough to make back the costs. A “token” that is nothing more than a ‘Looky – I bought me proof that I bought me a link!’. I'm sorry, but I honestly can't think of anyone I know that would spend/waste their money on a link token. (Though I do know several people that have spent hundreds commissioning art, but they were buying the art - not a mere token pointing at a link to the art.)
If the price(risk) to the artist was only a buck or two it might be one thing, if it doesn't work they're out very little; but we're talking hundreds of dollars for your token and a transfer for this 'proof of link bought thingy'. The only sure money maker in this “it's not really complicated” game is to be the one selling the “token” and collecting the transfer fees. That seems to be the real(only) “purpose of this”.
There are four types of NFT purchasers. I'm oversimplifying but I'm on mobile right now. :P (And if you saw this before I edited it, that's why I hate posting on mobile.)
When NFTs "crash," the lower end of investors and most speculators are going to get absolutely hosed. But they'll only suffer because they put money into a risky bet. People at the top of this plan to create the conditions under which their current investments will pay off, so it will probably be like what happened with crypto in general--it'll appear to die a foolish death for a bit, and then roar back and stick if their efforts keep succeeding.
There is arguably a fifth group in the small player end who know what the first two are about and think if they support it early and make the same choices they'll benefit. They're mostly going to get hosed too if it pans out. The entire point of making this happen is to consolidate power and influence, so if you're not already BFFs with people like MetaKovan you're probably in the same boat as the rest of us. If you are a company in this fifth group, get out now.
It appears that Daz has moved their NFT stuff to WAX, which appears to run on the PoS-based EOS blockchain, which is controlled by block.one, a company registered in the Cayman Islands.
Sadly they still have their stuff up on OpenSea, so basically all this is doing is creating an additional NFT channel people might feel fuzzier about. Not that the damage isn't already done on the OpenSea thing, but writing those off and not directing people to that platform at all would be more meaningful.
Another group is the ones doing money laundering https://cryptonews.com/exclusives/money-laundering-might-taint-nfts-too-prepare-for-tighter-co-9689.htm