Source: Pixabay, Maiconfz
There is nothing inherently wrong with NFTs, because NFTs are simply a method of ownership. Decentralizing the tracking of ownership is not a bad thing either, and it cuts out unnecessary middle-men and removes an unnecessary position of power. That said Jonathon and Quinn Button don’t really make any other compelling points for why we should be excited about NFTs other than decentralized ownership and digital proof of ownership. I also feel that they ignore some of the downsides of NFTs and the metaverse, whole heartedly diving into being mindless consumers of products. There are even multiple points during their speech where they talk about buying things just because its perceived as hip and cool such as when they talk about Supreme clothing.
To begin with, there is truly no real reason to purchase NFT art other than the alternative incentives tied to owning that art. Unlike a physical painting, you don’t need to purchase the art to look at it or even to display it in the privacy of your own home like the Buttons do. You can simply go look at it or save it and then print it out and hang it in your home or do anything you want provided you aren’t infringing on any copyright. So if you purchase NFT art you do so not because you think it looks cool but because you want to invest in that which is fine but an incredibly risky investment to make because the value once you mint your NFT is entirely derived from the supply and demand of that specific NFT. Jonathon Button also makes the strange claim that “you couldn’t have moving art like that before non-fungible tokens, the other thing about non-fungible tokens is they can be dynamic.” This is simply just an untrue statement, gifs and videos have been a form of moving art for decades now, and neither moving art nor dynamic art is tied to the blockchain.
All of the benefits of NFTs are just benefits of investing or owning things. Button talks about how NFTs are so cool because they let you do things like invest in musicians. Yet, you can go invest in an artist without buying an NFT, it is just easier to do so using an NFT because the artist is offering the investment rather than you seeking them out. For a large portion of their presentation they are essentially simply repeating that you can own things, just on the blockchain instead of by other means. NFTs are just digital proof of ownership on a decentralized record.
It's also worth noting that NFTs and the metaverse are not without their downsides. For example, according to statistica until July of 2021 the overwhelming majority of crypto was mined in China. Roughly 75% in September of 2019 and 43% in May of 2021. As of January 2022 they made up 21% while the US made up 37%. All of this information serves to show that highly industrialized countries are the ones mining the most, and the reason for that is because mining blockchain blocks is very intensive on computers so the countries that can burn the most coal to produce the most energy are the ones that will have the most miners. Also, they talk about how the metaverse blew up in popularity during the covid pandemic because people couldn’t go outside so they spent more time online and in virtual realities. Is it really a good thing that people would rather spend an increasing amount of their time in a virtual reality? A reality that they cease to exist in once they turn off their computer? Furthermore, the value created by things in the metaverse like concerts or virtual realty does nothing to generate value in the real world. When we already have so many issues that still need to be addressed in the real world it seems questionable to be concerned about monetizing virtual reality as much as possible. Rather than provide true value in the real world through a job like teaching, someone could be a virtual realty investor. The teacher provides real value because they perform a job that benefits society in some capacity. On the other hand, the virtual realty investor only provides value to the virtual universe. I find it somewhat disturbing that they point to the movie Ready Player One to introduce the metaverse, as Ready Player One is set in a dystopian universe where the real world is so decrepit that people would rather spend as much time as possible in a virtual world.