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Comment by iamben | Hacker News Reader

Gonna be honest - I don't really understand any of this.

IIRC the discussion the other day, where someone shared the terms, it stated they're buying the NFT not the copyright/rights to the video.

So what does deleting it actually mean? The NFT owner can't do anything with it other than say "I own the NFT" (they can't monetise it), and assuming there's going to be some kind of policing around the deletion, it's just going to be whack a mole on YouTube/WhateverTube with uploaders and people that still want to watch a cute video from 2007 (and don't care about NFTs or it being the 'actual, real, original' upload).

Strange times.

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NFTs remind me of 'buy a star' companies.

You apparently 'bought' a star but anyone can look at it, I imagine that multiple people own the same star and everyone is none the wiser.

I assume this is why NFTs work. Make someone pay for 'exclusivity' (real or not) and then just assume that most people won't look into the details, where the devil is.

What if the opportunity arose to purchase the Mona Lisa, but only with the unalterable condition that it remain in the Louvre forever.

Do you think it would sell for a high price?

Yes.

Sometimes the point is just ownership regardless of usage. Useful as a bragging point or money laundering opportunity.

If you got to put your name on the card at the museum I'm sure it would sell for something ridiculous.

I think this oversimplifies things. Would you “buy” the Mona Lisa from a random website with the condition that you have no rights to the property? I wouldn’t. If the Mona Lisa was put on sale by the Louvre with the aforementioned clause, I would be intrigued.

I mean, possibly, if you're the curator of the Louvre.

.. are you the curator of the Louvre?

I assume while we're on the topic that the guarantee has been written into a formal legal document, witnessed by a recognised party, that is enforceable in court, and which guarantees the terms in perpetuity?

I can give my opinion/guess to your question, and I still have no idea how it relates to NFTs.

> NFTs remind me of 'buy a star' companies.

Amazing comparison! They are truly the same.

Indeed. All this talk of NFTs, but what blockchain are they on? Don't new blockchains pop up everyday? I mean, my own blockchain (a text file I only append to, but let's not get sidetracked on implementation details) says I own Charlie Bit My Finger. Now what?

> my own blockchain (a spreadsheet

Gave me a good chuckle

If you were to input some sort of contract terms into a cell, snapshot it, upload it to the cloud and only provide view access to the public, you would have a full fledged blockchain platform.

Can't use Google Sheets because that would centralize it, I imagine?

i'll give you $300,000 in bitcoin if you put my name in that spreadsheet next to charlie bit my finger

>You apparently 'bought' a star but anyone can look at it

Next iteration, selling magnitude 20 stars. Not just anyone can look at those.

I have trouble understanding NFTs too (article author here).

The closest I’ve come to understanding them is this: an NFT is an abstract handle to which various rights can optionally be attached. So (in theory) it becomes an easy way to have a marketplace for those rights, and this previously hasn’t been simple for digital assets.

In this case, one of the rights attached to the NFT in the sale is that the counterparty may choose whether the YouTube-hosted video continues to be public. (And, in this case, I would argue that the specific YouTube endpoint is almost as significant as the video itself.)

But considering how trivially easy it is to just reupload the video, unless they plan to play copyright wack a mole, it will never actually be deleted.

I downloaded a copy the other day. We named our daughter Charlie, and when she's old enough we want her to understand why all the older people she meets think it's hilarious to say her name with a British accent.

> an NFT is an abstract handle to which various rights can optionally be attached

When there are no rights attached, I think of NFTs as a fancy system of provenance.

> an NFT is an abstract handle to which various rights can optionally be attached.

What I find confusing is the following:

Rights are meaningless without enforcement (in the real world). Who is going to enforce NFTs? There's no government or other authority standing behind this tech.

Compare NFTs with patents/digital rights - in both cases I "own" the artwork in some sense, but digital rights/patents, there are entire mechanisms that ensure these rights can be enforced.

With NFT, I can just ignore them without any issue.

My question is: how are NFT rights enforced?

You make a license that ties rights to the NFT, and use the legal system. E.g. a license that says "whoever holds this NFT gets the right to display the artwork it's for", if you want to sort-of match the sale of a traditional artwork.

In other words, its a digital certificate of ownership/rights that has no enforcement mechanism and still requires a contract, a lawyer, a court, and a society that enforces rights laws to run.

NFTs are actually speculation scams being run on the uninformed using buzzwords like blockchain and crypto while themselves being worthless. A digital certificate of authenticity for an infinitely reproducible good which still requires major cost and legal intervention to enforce.

A highly corrupt speculation scam using buzzwords about blockchain.

But which legal system?

I’m almost tempted to setup-shop ‘stealing’ NFTs and displaying them in a gallery, I imagine if I set everything up off shore to the US that I will risk pretty little

Anyone does DMCA etc even apply here? Even if it does, I can just host in a country that ignores it…

Just as you can with anything else copyrighted. Why would that be any different? NFTs just are a different way of tracking who has them, noting more.

Luckily there is nothing to enforce absent parties contractually tying rights to NFT holders. And at that point you just have a contract, enforced by the courts.

> My question is: how are NFT rights enforced?

Charlie and his older brother will work in the new compliance department where they search Youtube and Dailymotion every day and flag CBMF duplicate uploads.

My understanding is that buying an NFT is essentially buying the right to control a cell in a spreadsheet (the "shared ledger"). If you buy the NFT, you are buying the right to have your name in the "owner" column of a line in the spreadsheet that corresponds to a particular media identifier, at least until you transfer that right to someone else.

Absent further agreement by the parties, buying the line in the spreadsheet doesn't mean anything. You don't actually own or control anything other than having your name in that cell of the spreadsheet, next to an identifier (e.g. a URL) that identifies a piece of media.

There could be a thousand lines in the spreadsheet tied to the same piece of media. I.e., the original author of a piece of media can sell as many cells in the spreadsheet as he or she wants.

Owning an NFT -- meaning controlling the cell in the spreadsheet -- does not mean that you own the copyright or even that you have a license to display or copy the work unless the copyright holder chooses to tie those rights to whoever is in the cell in the spreadsheet. It just means that you control that cell for the time being.

I haven't seen the terms for this particular NFT sale, but there is no reason that they needed to remove it from YouTube unless they decided they wanted that to be part of the transaction.

I can explain this - a lot of people miss the point of NFTs so I can illustrate the value here.

Buying an NFT is kind of akin to buying an autographed photo (so in this case, the person has paid the money to buy a signature from the person who shot the clip originally).

If you buy a signed photograph from Taylor Swift, you don't own the rights to Taylor Swift, her likeness, or even that photograph - but you still have a photograph that Taylor Swift herself (probably) signed. You don't care if someone else uploads the same signed photograph of her or she sells the same signed photograph to thousands of other people. It doesn't matter - because you wanted a signed photograph of Taylor Swift.

Would anyone really pay $760,999 for a hash that references a YouTube clip and expect that they then "own" the video because they have the hash? Of course not. No-one is that naive. They just really wanted an autograph from the person who made the video, and thought their signature worth $760,999.

Does it matter if it's not worth anything to anyone else? No more than it matters to a Taylor Swift fan if other people are not as excited about the photo they could have looked at for free but decided to pay $760,999 for.

As long as the buyer is happy with the autograph, and the understanding that it provides no rights whatsoever and is likely not worth much to anyone else, what's the problem with them spending SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTY THOUSAND AND NINE HUNDRED AND NINETY-NINE DOLLARS for an autograph from the Charlie bit my finger dad?

Now, you may think to yourself that almost $800K USD is a bit much for a single autograph from a person that shot a YouTube video one time that got popular by random chance, but you have to remember that no matter what happens that buyer is going to be telling their grandkids one of two really interesting stories on their deathbed that both centre around that autograph.

Except I don't think you've even bought a copy of the photograph - the autograph is the only thing you've bought.

EXACTLY. The NFT does not necessarily come with a right to copy or display the work. You don't own the work; you own the NFT.

Yeah but the buyer really wanted that autograph, though.

I came to the comment section to better understand what's the opinion on NFTs too :)). I could see some edge-case uses with these NFTs, but I feel a lot of its usefulness is exaggerated. In my opinion, anything that's digital can't have its access enforced once out in the public. Only laws can restrict an agent (humans, usually) from gaining contact with the digital asset if it's public (or out in the public by any means, be it a copy on the internet or a CD, HDD, card etc.). I keep thinking my opinion is wrong and there's something magic about these NFTs that I didn't understand.

If you were ignoring the collectibles market before NFTs, you can ignore the collectibles market now.

The concept is not that hard, no different than purchasing a pokemon card, or more aptly a ‘rare’ skin in an online game.

Its just microtransactions that everyone can verify if you were first or not. The market willingness to pay a premium just bakes in the lack of need for appraisal or legal dispute over the collectible ownership history. It has nothing to do with actual superior rights conveyed.

Let's say I buy a collectible silver coin which is a limited edition emitted by the government or some entity. This has both value in that it's rare, and that it's made of silver and so can appreciate in value over time.

Would it be correct to think of NFTs in the same way, but adding a higher risk associated to it? (the risk of the copy leaking in the public and thus cancelling any benefit of the supposed ownership this NFT blockchain would grant - excluding the possibility of an NFT blockchain becoming some kind of worldwide enforced standard way of verifying ownership...but even then...)

Yes but I think you are overthinking the risk and overestimating the formation of a secondary market.

But most people overestimate these things in the collectible market.

All you get is the ease of prior price discovery and history of ownership. That’s only useful after the market has decided your edition was the valuable edition.

Copies leaking isn’t important because the history of ownership shows you were the only owner, at an earlier date. Literally solves all of the provenance and forgery issues that have plagued art world for millenium. People pay a premium for just that. Has nothing to do with comparisons to physical attributes or rare metals used. Like I said, a better analogy - for now - would be improvements to rare items in online games that people already were spending time and resources to acquire and trade. If you recall, many people weren’t willing to understand intangibles there either. Regardless, it is an extension of the same crowd and the same sentiment. Shareholders in the gaming company could pressure them to increase the supply of a rare item in a database, with NFTs that is not possible as earlier provenance can’t be modified. It assumes the market is discerning but if it already cares about a piece than it is. If it doesn’t, a secondary market would likely never form for the “investment” to begin with.

No. While both rare coins and NFTs have value as a collectable, it's different because the silver coin has at least some intrinsic value. NFTs do not.

If no one else wants your NFT, it's not worth anything. If one other person wants it, it's worth whatever it is to them. If you buy NFTs for value, you should consider it a part time job to continue the hype machine for your NFTs in the hopes of getting some sort of bidding war going for them among as many people as possible. This isn't so different from other collectible markets. This hype machine is likely the reason you know what an NFT is in the first place.

I like how we said the same thing but started our answers with the opposite conclusion.

Collectibles are limited editions, or otherwise rare or hard to find items for hobbyists. Stamps, baseball cards, antique furniture pieces etc. It's a market because there are a community of people with that shared interest. Is there such a community around this?

CBMF is a grainy home video that doesn't feature anybody famous, or provide context to some historic event. There is no CBMF fan club. It's just a transient memory for most people, one out of numerous YT videos they've watched over the years.

You tried to make a distinction about collectibles that doesn’t exist. The universe has always been much broader than that.

The other responses expand on it.

It’s not our problem if there is a secondary market or not or ability to resell to anyone that cares ever.

I liked the idea of NBA Top Shot, but it is clearly a victim of its own success. I wasn't a card collector growing up, but I knew baseball cards would become more in demand if a player broke out, won an award, or became famous by some other means. Smarter fans were able to forecast that, and were able flaunt their collection or sell for a profit.

But for the most part this was playground stuff or convention centers. Now you have one centralized marketplace where all fans from anywhere in the world compete, so the most lucrative approach is to court "whales" who can spend extravagantly. I just wish there were a way for them to set up "minor leagues" so it can become an approachable hobby again.

I think of NFTs like a digital receipt.

I get the impression that the folks spending a lot on NFTs are using some kind of crypto coin to pay, and that crypto coin may have a certain dollar valuation now but had a much lower dollar value when they obtained the coin. In other words it doesn't feel like they are actually spending the dollars, the effort to obtain those coins was less than the effort to obtain the actual dollars.

NFTs make money laundering and tax evasion exponentially easier than traditional collectibles. They’re also a new enough thing that asking for forgiveness after getting caught just might work.

There’s also the get-rich-quick aspect. A lot of the same reasons people “invest” in crypto. Exclusivity, novelty, and a lot of really naive traders flush with crypto cash.

Could the owner of the NFT own the copyright to the video? If so, buying the NFT would provide the right to sue people who are violating that copyright, right?

So they have no rights to use the video.

I'm not sure what the difference to this and an NFT I made of say the Mona Lisa or a Vincent van Gogh painting.

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