You know what a certificate of authenticity is for a physical piece of art? Like, a chain of documented ownership that can be used to prove your art is the original and not a copy?
NFTs are like that, except for digital assets. They use cryptographic wizardry to provide a means of proof that a copy of a digital file that you have on your computer was issued to you by an authorised holder, who was in turn issued their copy by an authorised holder, all the way back to the file’s original author.
To be clear, there’s absolutely nothing stopping you from making unauthorised copies of an NFT, in the same way that there’s nothing stopping you from printing out a photo of the Mona Lisa. All this system does is provide proof of authorised ownership.
This actually has some practical applications; for example, in online gaming, it can be used to create a relatively foolproof means of detecting item duping, and of figuring out who has the legit item and who has the dupe when such exploits occur.
For digital art it’s 100% a bragging rights thing and has no real, practical value.
There are several problems with this.
First, the terms of service for most existing NFT exchanges are deeply exploitative for both the artist and the buyer, and there’s a fairly solid argument to be made that their main goal is to provide money laundering services rather than to exchange digital art.
(This is not, of course, a new thing; there’s a fairly solid argument to be made that that all high-end art collecting is a money laundering scheme.)
Second, most NFT exchanges make absolutely no effort to verify that the person attaching an NFT to a particular digital file is actually that file’s author.
This means that NFT exchanges have a rampant problem with uncredited or falsely credited art being circulated as high-value collectibles. Again, there’s an argument to be made that this is by design.
Finally, there’s the environmental impact to consider.
NFTs require cryptography.
Cryptography is math.
Doing math with a computer takes processing power.
Processing power consumes electricity.
The math that produces the particular kind of NFTs that all the hubbub is about has deliberately been made very, very inefficient to carry out. In theory, this makes them harder to counterfeit.
(Whether this is actually true, and what other, less energy intensive mechanisms could be used to achieve the same result, is a whole other post!)
The amount of processing involved in issuing these particular NFTs is so brain-fuckingly huge that it’s effectively impossible to do it using a home computer – it has to be contracted out to specialised server farms.
The upshot is that every NFT that’s issued causes the server farms that produce them to consume vast amounts of electricity, with the associated environmental costs.
It’s only a slight exaggeration to say that the present NFT art craze provides a means for private individuals to have the kind of environmental impact normally associated with large corporations.
If this whole business is starting to sound like a scheme a Captain Planet villain would come up with, now you’re catching on!
So apparently, over the summer, Quibi (the shortest-lasting streaming service ever lmao) did a quarantine project called “Home Movie: The Princess Bride” where a bunch of celebrities recreated The Princess Bride in tiny chunks at home.
And like there was no permanent cast, all these celebrities seem to have gotten a scene or part of a scene to do (i’m not sure exactly, I did not ever watch Quibi and thus haven’t seen this yet), and then they just… recreated it as best they could. At home. Under quarantine.
So like, you had Jennifer Garner in a blanket cape playing Princess Buttercup AND the Booing Old Woman with a crowd comprised entirely of stuffed animals:
Or Taika Waititi paying Westley off a badly-drawn Inigo on a piece of cardboard held in front of someone’s face:
And it’s all just delightful.
But my absolute favorite part of this thing that I’ve sadly never seen but assume is probably absolutely hilarious and a treasure and I want to find it some day and watch the whole thing… is that Carey Elwes is in it.
i do care if someone hires someone to clean though like you can’t just throw that out there as if it isn’t well known that those people that are hired to clean your home exist because they’re poor. wash your own dirty dishes
I understand what you’re saying, but you also seem to be ignoring the fact that people who are hiring these poor people to clean their houses are giving those people jobs. If they weren’t hiring them to clean their houses, these people may not have a job at all.
i don’t agree with this logic. i don’t think we need to settle for a job or nothing, is the same to be said for women who work under slavery like conditions in clothing factories in poor countries? why can’t we fight for change instead of accepting that some people just have to be maids
Before she moved in to take care of her, my aunt hired a maid to come to my disabled grandmother’s house once a week to clean for like 2-3 hours and paid her $80 every time she came over. There’s no way my grandmother, who had a bum hip from a car accident and hobbled around with her walker (back when she could even walk), could clean her own house. Maids provide an invaluable service, especially for the elderly and disabled, and they shouldn’t be eliminated just because you think their jobs are somehow not good enough for anyone to be doing. Many jobs like housecleaners, gardeners, etc., are great for people who may not speak the local language, who may have had a limited education, or who came here as adults with limited opportunities. My grandfather, who could speak four languages fluently but his English sucked, became a janitor at the age of 58 to support his family when they first came to America, and his kids always advocated that you should treat blue-collar and traditionally low-paid workers with respect because those jobs are valuable and even someone who cleans toilets is a person who is trying their best. Basically, we shouldn’t try to eliminate these jobs; they should just be better compensated.
There are like 6 cleaning companies in my local area and they’re all run by local women who just LOVE CLEANING
We really need to stop thinking that some jobs are ‘beneath’ people.
If you can’t/don’t want to do something that needs done, hire someone.
But PAY THEM for their value and RESPECT THEM as people
It isn’t humiliating to do basic labor as long as you’re treated with dignity.
back to the original energy of the post “eat the rich” means “eat the people who massed more wealth than can be spent in a lifetime by exploiting their employees and are actively trying to squeeze them for even more”
if your first thought when you hear me say “i hate leeches” is ‘vampires’ and not 'landlords’ unfollow me. this is a pro-vampire, anti-landlord only zone.
Actually, my first thought was “leeches”, but more power to you
