Digital art piece NFT sold for record breaking $69 million

[HEXUS]

Auction house Christie's sold Mike Winkelmann's 'Everydays' digital collage yesterday.

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[QuorTek]

This is awesome

[Scryder]

This is such a dumb trend and such a waste of energy! Welcome to the next Tulip Mania.

I found this video useful to understand what NFT's are, I was particularly interested on the power consumption, it's bad!: NFT Explained: Why They're Nifty and Terrible (He does need to sort his camera's auto-focus!)

Also the "verifiable ownership" argument is one of the supposed positive... there are other ways to prove ownership... Copyright law has been around a lot longer. And there are court cases where ownership has been determined for example, songs in the 90's, long before NFT's or bitcoin existed (I assume these are relatively new!). All done without massive energy consumption.

[six_tymes]

idiot with too much money, money that could have and should have helped others in need.

[Gentle Viking]

Well people can spend their honest earned money as they please, but i reserve the right to have a opinion on that transaction.

And i call stupid.

[badass]

This is such a dumb trend and such a waste of energy! Welcome to the next Tulip Mania.

I found this video useful to understand what NFT's are, I was particularly interested on the power consumption, it's bad!: NFT Explained: Why They're Nifty and Terrible (He does need to sort his camera's auto-focus!)

Also the "verifiable ownership" argument is one of the supposed positive... there are other ways to prove ownership... Copyright law has been around a lot longer. And there are court cases where ownership has been determined for example, songs in the 90's, long before NFT's or bitcoin existed (I assume these are relatively new!). All done without massive energy consumption.

I thoroughly agree with all of your statement. However I've highlighted in bold a piece of particular importance. People have already been tokenising other peoples work without their permission.

i.e. the whole point of this NFT utter, utter garbage already doesn't work.

[badass]

Well people can spend their honest earned money as they please, but i reserve the right to have a opinion on that transaction.

And i call stupid.

Another statement I completely agree with. All parts.

[DanceswithUnix]

Sounds like some artists are already pulling out of this on environmental grounds.

[Scryder]

That's good. But unfortunately there are others with less morals that are signing up. Greed is definitely a factor here, from what I've seen...

[Spreadie]

This bashing of crypto-currency mining in isolation seems to be lazy, and somewhat ignorant; not to mention hella trendy.

A couple of years ago, reports started coming out stating the cost of mining Bitcoin was greater than the cost of mining gold. A real headline grabber, but lazy and inaccurate - The cost of mining, refining and transporting gold and other materials out-strips cryptomining which, while on the rise, does consume huge amounts of energy. However, the environmental cost per coin is constantly reducing, and is actually being seen as a catalyst for the greater push for renewables.

Mining costs of gold and the like don't appear to be reducing at all, and are increasing in some cases, from my (admittedly cursory) reading of the matter. Not to mention the physical scars on the environment from such operations.

I'm not looking to indulge in whataboutism here, and I'm not defending mining as such, it's just the hot topic and gets far too much of the negative attention deserved by the physical mining industries.

[DanceswithUnix]

, and is actually being seen as a catalyst for the greater push for renewables.

Now, I struggle with that bit.

I was reading the other day how in Texas natural gas was being flared off from oil pumps and in some cases amazingly even just vented to atmosphere (gulp!), so a couple of blokes started burning the gas in generators and powering crypto mining efforts from them, and apparently this was considered good for the environment. Now hopefully the rolling blackouts are over in Texas (not checked), but surely burning that gas *and feeding the electricity back into the grid* is the sane thing to do as that can cut carbon emissions from some coal powered station elsewhere on the grid and actually cut carbon footprint.

There is always an opportunity cost in these things, so putting solar panels in is good, but then plugging that opportunity to help the world into a bunch of Antminers saddens me.

The electronics industry at least requires gold, so whilst the traditional mining industry does have a bad rap I don't see any similarity to crypto mining beyond name and struggle to see any useful comparison.

[Gentle Viking]

Artists in Denmark are actually subsidized, and the government have a huge art collection that collect dirt in a basement.
So you will be right if you call Danish artists for glorified welfare clients.

I call BS in this approach and insist on not a shilling of my tax money are used on stuff like that, the arts must carry their own weight or perish.

[badass]

and is actually being seen as a catalyst for the greater push for renewables.

Now, I struggle with that bit.

Essentially the argument there is "waste huge amounts of non renewable energy to encourage the move to renewable energy to then be wasted"
I more than struggle with that bit!

[Spreadie]

Essentially the argument there is "waste huge amounts of non renewable energy to encourage the move to renewable energy to then be wasted"
I more than struggle with that bit!

No, that wasn't my argument. Don't be ridiculous. My argument is that it's trendy to bash it, and decry it's existence without looking beyond the name, with assumptions being made that it's all just wasteful, unproductive proof of work with no tangible benefit.

The simple fact is that it isn't going to go away and still largely in it's formative years, so it's a natural progression that people will seek to improve efficiency and reduce environmental impact.

Just about every major industry that began by scarring the landscape, producing pollution or was seen as hugely inefficient despite being adopted has undergone changes to mitigate the damage. Quarries and mines have to put forward restoration plans before receiving approval to extend or break new ground. The automotive industry has fuel efficiency targets. Even planning for new housing estates or retail developments is contingent upon the developer earning "green" points for anything from the type of insulation used to installing biomass generators to reduce load on the grid.

[Saracen999]

wtf! didital art pffft

While I entirely agree with Gentle Viking, is that "pffft" in relation to digital art in general, or those particular examples?

If digital art in general, then I entirely disagree - there is some stunning digital art, and has been for a good couple of decades at least. This I know because I went to Canada about 20 years ago as a judge at an international digital art competition, and not only got to see some of the works (or at least, printed representations of them) up close and in person, but met a few of the artists.

But digital art, like any other art I guess, is in the eye of the beholder. For instance, I like Monet but wouldn't even hang a Van Gogh in my second loo.

Which leads me to the 'if it relates to the Everyday art .... is it my taste?' Not really. But, ignoring relative financial values, I'd rather have some of those than a Van Gogh. And could I do any of those Beeple works? No. Nor, for that matter, could I do as Van Gogh did. My friend's eight year-old daughter, though .... she probably could.

[Scryder]

So, this was inevitable... I saw a tweet yesterday from an artist who said:

This afternoon, someone tagged a NFT account on my Spinosaurus painting.
As such, I have deleted all my art tweets. I am reposting them here with watermarks.
It's a bit of a gamble for me so retweets are very much appreciated and help me get my art back out there

I don't doubt this person, as they seem to have some good art... but man! This sucks.

This is similar to what @badass said above...


Edit: So I looked at some more of this person's art, and they're awesome... but he's had to watermark them now... would've made nice wallpapers... damn!