I don't understand how this is not tantamount to someone selling pieces of the local Olive Garden franchise for $100. That person could equivalently claim satire, because there's no way that could happen in real life.
Satire doesn't stop being satire just because you used the name of a business.
>Or at least, you have to be very careful.
Check out the FAQ on the website for that bit[1].
> For too long, ownership of Olive Garden franchises has been dominated by the capricious whims of the fiat system. That’s why we’re enabling anyone to trustlessly mint a nonfungible token representing 1 of 880 real Olive Garden franchises in the United States.
Again, they are falsely promising "ownership of a franchise" and "representation of a franchise" right there in the website. Nowhere does it say that the actual ownership will be of an image.
I suppose a skilled lawyer could make the case that they are obviously joking because all NFTs are worthless images, but that would be a bit of an uphill battle in my opinion given the deceptive wording here.
The first sentence is simply untrue. The second sentence is accurate on your part and on the creators' parts: you don't own the picture.
How is it untrue? I'll quote it in its entirety.
> For too long, ownership of Olive Garden franchises has been dominated by the capricious whims of the fiat system.
"For too long, ownership of X has been dominated by Y" is a typical sentence used in advertisements that go on to promise "Now, you too can own X" – so it's reasonable to think that the same is the implication in this case too, especially if your continuing sentence is "That’s why we’re enabling anyone to blah blah blah representing 1 of 880 real Olive Garden franchises in the United States."
Edit: after a bit more conversation and reading the page carefully, they are actually promising some ownership, but in a "Roadmap" as a sneaky way out:
> Use project funds to complete leveraged buyout of Darden Restaurants, Olive Garden's parent company. Upon successful completion, all NFOG franchise owners will now own real Olive Garden franchises.
You misunderstand; they are referring to where you incorrectly quote the website as saying, "ownership of a franchise".
>"For too long, ownership of X has been dominated by Y" is a typical sentence used in advertisements that go on to promise "Now, you too can own X"...
Which they don't really do here, so that point is moot.
What they do go on to say is that you can mint an NFT that represents a franchise, but what you're misunderstanding is the word "represent". Anything can represent anything - the pancake I just made (hooray, breakfast for dinner!) can represent the White House. The bicycle in my garage can represent the International Space Station while I'm out playing with my kids. That doesn't mean that the pancake is the White House, or that my bicycle representing the ISS now means that I own the ISS. Quite simply, it means that for the sake of whatever I'm doing - discussing politics, playing with my kids, or making a parody website that makes fun of NFTs - the NFT itself represents a franchise just because. It sounds stupid, but so are NFTs, and that's the point.
That is why myself and others have stressed to you that you need to read the FAQ and the parts where the site goes on to confirm that you do not own, nor have rights to, any Olive Garden franchise just because you have an NFT that represents one.
My view is that convoluted arguments like this are fine for winning an argument with your friends, and maybe even on an orange website.
They are unlikely to cut ice with the legal system when you get hauled up for accepting money for some "representation" of a trademarked franchise. But I guess time will tell. A good experiment for the authors of this would be go on to offer NFT pictures of Disney characters next, and then go on to explain to Disney's lawyers how they aren't actually Finding Dory, just a token that is a representation of Finding Dory.
>Again, they are falsely promising "ownership of a franchise" and "representation of a franchise" right there in the website.
First, ctrl+F "ownership of a franchise" brings up no results, so you're misquoting the website. Second, "representation" is a word that can be used loosely; the NFT can be a representation of the franchise, but that doesn't mean you legally own it. I could sell a stick figure drawing of myself that represents me, but that doesn't mean that you own me.
>Nowhere does it say that the actual ownership will be of an image.
Correct, but it does say, in the FAQ:
>While every Non-fungible Olive Garden is tethered to a real Olive Garden, ownership is currently limited to the Non-fungible Olive Garden Metaverse, granting owners no rights or privileges in meatspace Olive Gardens.
It goes on to say:
>Is this affiliated with Olive Garden?
>No.
I am really not sure how much clearer they can get than that.
Everything at the Olive Garden comes out of a plastic pouch cooked in boiling water or microwaved. It's a place where you go to sit down and pay to have TV dinners served to you.
You're just making up rules now.
It does happen in real life.
Government issued Title Deeds for property are the NFT's we had before anybody heard of the term. If the Title's Office says you own the deed, then by definition you own the property. If doesn't matter if you have the property in your possession, built a house on it, or paid a bank for it. All that matters is the Title's Office says you own it. If they do you can take possession of it, tear down the house, and the person who paid the bank for it handed over money for nothing.
That may sound scary, but in reality the Title Offices are pretty good at checking the current owner has authorised the transfer to a new owner. But they aren't perfect: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/she-had-n... And while such mistakes are generally very rare in any one locality (maybe once a decade where I live), I be surprised if it didn't happen once per day in the world at large.
I don't know how it works elsewhere, but where I live the government has a "all care and no responsibility" clause excusing themselves (ie, the Titles Office) from all liability when they do make the occasional mistake, including any responsibility for "setting it right". So once the illegal transfer has happened, it's over. There is no recourse. It's very like a bitcoin transaction in that way.
I smile inwardly when I see people claim NFT's could never work, or are ponzi schemes, or a throw a thousand other barbs when the reality is we've been using something like them for centuries. Unlike Pork Belly futures, put options and CDO's (which, when you think about it, are also a form of NFT from yesteryear), at least (usually, for now) they represent something tangible. It's true that rather some hand crafted legalisation like title law that takes years and an act of parliament to create, the link between the NFT and the thing they represent generally relies on contract law. Anyone can draft a contract of course, in theory a verbal agree suffices. I'm no lawyer, so I don't really know if a well drafted contract is weaker or not. I can say with some authority that signing things with private crypto keys is a damned sight more secure that how the title's office verifies you have ownership now.