• AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    1 year ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Tens of thousands of NFTs that were once deemed the newest rage in tech and dragged in celebrities, artists and even Melania Trump have now been declared virtually worthless.

    NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are a form of crypto asset that is used to certify ownership and authenticity of a digital file including an image, video or text.

    The report comes nearly two years after the craze for NFTs swept up celebrities and artists alike, with many rushing to purchase NFT collections of the Bored Ape Yacht Club and Matrix avatars.

    The drastic downward market shift surrounding such crypto assets “underscores the need for careful due diligence before making any purchases, especially one of high value”, the report said.

    Researchers identified 195,699 NFT collections with no apparent owners or market share and found that the energy required to mint the NFTs was comparable to 27,789,258 kWh, resulting in an emission of approximately 16,243 metric tons of CO2.

    In order to survive market downturns and have lasting value, NFTs need to be either historically relevant such as first-edition Pokémon cards, true art or provide genuine utility, they said in the report.


    The original article contains 650 words, the summary contains 189 words. Saved 71%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • roguetrick@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    To be real, even cryptobros would tell you the vast majority were useless as soon as they were minted.

    • fsxylo@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      It’s why they pushed them so hard. They hoped we were stupid enough to buy into it and make them richer.

  • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    Given that they can be generated effectively for free, this is hardly surprising or particularly meaningful. I can generate ten thousand new images with my AI art generator for basically zero cost and I don’t expect any would be economically valuable, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some images that are valuable.

  • squiblet@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    Perhaps they’d have retained value if they had been attached to quality art rather than awful-looking algorithmically generated complete trash.

    • Dr Cog@mander.xyz
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      1 year ago

      No, they wouldn’t have. Because owning a link to a thing doesn’t mean anything, no matter what that thing is. They were only valuable because people didn’t understand NFTs and wanted to get rich quick.

      • squiblet@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        The concept of a certificate of authenticity for digital goods that can be traded isn’t inherently terrible.

        • Dr Cog@mander.xyz
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          1 year ago

          The concept isn’t, I agree. But it also isn’t a useful idea, either. There really doesn’t appear to be any benefit to using NFTs in any meaningful application, or at least nobody has pitched one that isn’t either a grift or a way to appear “trendy” by reinventing the wheel.

          • squiblet@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            Some established, legitimate artists have been selling NFTs with their originals. But sure, overall, like crypto in general, the field is filled with scammers and get-rich-quick schemes.
            I know someone who is a painter who for some reason decided to try selling NFTs a couple of months ago (I pointed out it was a bit late…). The only responses on opensea and Instagram she received were from scammers, trying to pull a “my payment didn’t work, you need to manually approve it” scheme to try to steal her credentials.

            • SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca
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              1 year ago

              She could also simply write down the name of the person who bought the painting from you. And ask them to let her know if they sell it so she could update her records.

              Sure it’s possible someone might not let her know they sold the painting. But it’s equally possible someone sells the painting without transferring the NFT along with it.

              • squiblet@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                Sure, and instead of credit cards, the store can just write down on an index card that I owe them $60. Anyway, the idea is a level of automation exceeding what they had in Sumeria 7,000 years ago.

          • Grimpen@lemmy.ca
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            1 year ago

            The actual infrastructure was horribly inefficient, but that may have improved with ETH’s move to proof of stake.

            There’s other issues, but the idea of using the digital receipt as an “investment” seems fundamentally flawed.

  • magnetosphere @beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    I can imagine being desperate to hit it big, but at least but a lottery ticket or something. That way, the school system (or whatever) gets a few bucks, instead of the fucking Trumps.