ARTICLE NFT FOR SALE NFTs : MONEY OR MAGIC BEANS ?
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efore you start reading, I need to come clean about something: This article isn’t real. You can still read it, but it’s a fake. The original is scribbled down, in biro, on the back of a pair of plane tickets I printed out last week. This article is just a typed up copy of that one. They weren’t the original plane tickets either. The originals were sent to me as PDFs in an email- and even they were just digital representations of the idea that, in about a week, I’m allowed to get on a plane. If you want the one, genuine, original, article, I can sell it to you. How will you know it’s the original? I’ll give you the NFT. “How much??” “$69 million, dad.” “Yeah, I read about it in the paper, actually. People who throw their money away like that should have it taken away from them and given to a good cause.” The well enunciated East-London accent you just read belongs to my father. Dad was in the meat trade in London and was born in 1939. I decided last week I’d try and explain NFTs to him for a laugh. I told him about the digital artist “Beeple,” who had just sold the NFT for his work ““Everydays - The First 5000 Days” for $69 million. “I think it’s a load of old nonsense. It’s a scam, to my mind.” I realize this has been done. Twitter is full of the well-thumbed accounts of people whose dads come out with their takes on modern life; some are hilarious, some thought provoking... and yes, some are racist. They’re almost all interesting, though; there’s a rea14 M. CITIZEN MAGAZINE | ISSUE 04
WORDS BY CHRIS O’SHEA
son this is a trend. There’s something about asking the 1930’s what it thinks of 2021 and getting an answer. In case you haven’t heard: NFTs are all the rage. They’re like digital certificates of authenticity. A music track can have one, a video clip, a tweet... an article about NFTs. A digital tag can be produced that proclaims this the one, authentic...thing that it is. Ownership of these tags confers on the bearer no rights at all: The owner of the NFT for a song cannot use that song in a movie, or profit from that song on Spotify, without separately obtaining the copyright. Similarly, the “owner” of the NFT for a piece of digital art can’t order the piece taken down. In other words an NFT is like a baseball card. It’s something you just “have.” Not to get too technical, but NFTs were made possible by the same Blockchain software that enables the creation of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. Bitcoin relies, for its value, on there being a finite number of Bitcoins and an accurate record of who owns them. The Blockchain is that record. Previously, owning a digital “object” was a bit like trying to write your name on a puff of smoke. The Blockchain ensures that, no matter how many times something is copied and shared, there will always be a record of who owns the “original.” So, back to Beeple. Let’s say you buy a pen; you get to decide who uses it and for how long, you can sell it or destroy it. The pen’s physical existence gives you control. Control is what ownership is to generations brought up without digital stuff. When it comes to NFTs, vast wealth has been handed over and
