JPG file sells for US $69 million

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

This is about as stupid as it gets.

It is stupid only for those who see no end game to this other than ownership. For someone who intends to re-sell it for profit, it's not stupid, but purely speculative.

The art used to be commissioned, bought and owned only by the royalty, clergy and noblemen. It was never commissioned or owned with re-sale considerations in mind. Then came art galleries and art dealers for the ambitious commoners and the game of hype started. Now, add the power of social media and massive amount of capital amassed without too much hard work in a relatively few hands and you get a perfect breeding ground for stuff like this to proliferate.

There was an excellent article in the New Yorker Magazine a couple of ears ago about a slimy art appraiser turned a slimy art dealer, who has built a duty-free art warehouse fortress next to an international airport in Europe, where the uber-rich can keep their art and trade it among themselves. We, the plebs, cannot even comprehend the amount of money being exchanged for nothing based only on an advice from these people.

[Muffins]

Originally Posted by BloodFetish

They should store it on a USB drive, then mount the drive on a canvas and hang it in the Louvre.

Turning digital art into modern art. Sounds like something that would sell for $100 mil easily. Maybe the buyer isn't that dumb after all.

[GreenLantern2814]

Audit whoever the #### bought this.

[flizzenflozz]

Originally Posted by Tkachukwagon

Nice

That will never not be funny

[GGG]

Originally Posted by CaptainYooh

It is stupid only for those who see no end game to this other than ownership. For someone who intends to re-sell it for profit, it's not stupid, but purely speculative.

The art used to be commissioned, bought and owned only by the royalty, clergy and noblemen. It was never commissioned or owned with re-sale considerations in mind. Then came art galleries and art dealers for the ambitious commoners and the game of hype started. Now, add the power of social media and massive amount of capital amassed without too much hard work in a relatively few hands and you get a perfect breeding ground for stuff like this to proliferate.

There was an excellent article in the New Yorker Magazine a couple of ears ago about a slimy art appraiser turned a slimy art dealer, who has built a duty-free art warehouse fortress next to an international airport in Europe, where the uber-rich can keep their art and trade it among themselves. We, the plebs, cannot even comprehend the amount of money being exchanged for nothing based only on an advice from these people.

This brings an interesting question. If the computer the jpg is on comes into the US do you have to pay taxes on it?

[btimbit]

I can't even wrap my head around cryptocurrency and now they hit me with this?

[Winsor_Pilates]

I dont understand anything I've read in this thread

[dino7c]

Another Beeple piece, “Crossroad” — a 10-second video NFT showing animated pedestrians walking past a giant, naked likeness of Donald J. Trump, collapsed on the ground and covered in graffiti — sold for $6.6 million in Ether on Nifty Gateway. The seller was Miami-based art collector Pablo Rodriguez-Fraile, who had brought the piece in October for about $67,000, according to Reuters.

This might turn out okay for the buyer. He likely gets massive royalties from every news outlet using the photo and then flips it to another guy with money burning a hole in his Olympic size swimming pool full of money.

[Itse]

NFT:s have such a massive carbon footprint, like bitcoins, that most likely this technology will either be taxed out of existence or outright banned.

This is stupid rich people buying in on the newest fad.

[combustiblefuel]

Originally Posted by Leondros

Technically you don't own it and do not have the rights to reproduce it. The same copyright law applies.

My screensaver says otherwise...

[Wastedyouth]

This is as dumb as any art.

Art is dumb.

Or more so, people who buy art are dumb.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Wastedyouth

This is as dumb as any art.

Art is dumb.

Or more so, people who buy art are dumb.

I don't agree with this at all. Are your walls bare? I like having pleasing things to look at and I basically have zero artistic talent. What that means is I have to pay someone else for that stuff!

I'm not sold on the NFT because it seems like the token itself is the scarce item (not the art or highlight clip), but the pieces of art are not the same thing to me.

[Fuzz]

I've got lots of art pieces I've picked up in markets around the world. The money presumably went to the artist. I like it on my walls. So I don't think all art is dumb. But paying huge amounts of money when the artist sees none of it? That's dumb. And this NFT is particularity dumb.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I've got lots of art pieces I've picked up in markets around the world. The money presumably went to the artist. I like it on my walls. So I don't think all art is dumb. But paying huge amounts of money when the artist sees none of it? That's dumb. And this NFT is particularity dumb.

Unfortunately though, that's kind of how art works. The artist creates something and sells it for the price they can. Then it gets resold and suddenly the asking price is ludicrous...but the artist isn't seeing any of that. The could create another piece and hopefully the asking price there is bigger windfall for them, but that doesn't always work out either.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by Itse

...
This is stupid rich people buying in on the newest fad.

Come on, Itse, you are one of the more sensible posters here. You don’t get to be rich by being stupid unless you strike a massive lottery win. To those who pay tens of millions for a piece of painted cloth or a jpg image, this money is pocket change and an investment bet. “Artistic value” does not enter the equation. At worst, if they can’t re-sell, they can always donate this stuff for name recognition and tax deductions.

The common point of view is that it doesn’t affect general public; it’s just uber-rich playing their uber-rich games. But it does. It is much easier to approve a $1M rusted metal beam monstrosity commissioned on public tax money as a public sculpture by a bunch of appointed board members. “Hey, it’s only a million. Look, jpg’s are selling for $65m!” Who’s stupid here - the rich, the governments or the public?

[tkflames]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

I dont understand anything I've read in this thread

You can either believe the complex mumbo jumbo...or just read it as..."internet invents new way to launder drug money"....

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by CaptainYooh

It is stupid only for those who see no end game to this other than ownership. For someone who intends to re-sell it for profit, it's not stupid, but purely speculative.

The art used to be commissioned, bought and owned only by the royalty, clergy and noblemen. It was never commissioned or owned with re-sale considerations in mind. Then came art galleries and art dealers for the ambitious commoners and the game of hype started. Now, add the power of social media and massive amount of capital amassed without too much hard work in a relatively few hands and you get a perfect breeding ground for stuff like this to proliferate.

There was an excellent article in the New Yorker Magazine a couple of ears ago about a slimy art appraiser turned a slimy art dealer, who has built a duty-free art warehouse fortress next to an international airport in Europe, where the uber-rich can keep their art and trade it among themselves. We, the plebs, cannot even comprehend the amount of money being exchanged for nothing based only on an advice from these people.

Wasn’t that part of the plot of Tenet?

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Wasn’t that part of the plot of Tenet?

While it was a part of it there are real places like that, they are called freeports I think.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Wasn’t that part of the plot of Tenet?

Only in the part of the existence of such facility. The reality of that is much more entertaining. It involved a few Russian oligarchs who paid some unreal sums for the paintings with questionable provenance provided by affiliates/associates of the dealer/warehouse owner. But the most bizarre part of this whole affair was the complete uncertainty about any provenance validity. The courts could not rule on the disputes conclusively. Nobody knows anything for sure. It’s all guesses by people recognised as experts by other dealers. Yet, their expertise is all made-up and fictitious. Now, if I recall correctly, the art in question was presumably Da Vinci’s, whose work is studied by the most reputable museums in the world. And even they could not all agree on it.

Fast forward to now and you have a bunch of nobodies pumping up a collage of jpegs. Stupid? I don’t think so. Cynical and far-reaching? Abso-f...n’- lutely.

[Regular_John]

Money laundering.