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> The problem of authenticating art before this, for a digital artist, was that you HAD to have a gallery do it with you in order for it to work. No one trusted anyone, not even the artist, to say that there would only be "10 copies" of that digital artwork, since they couldn't do any follow through if the artist decided to say there were ten copies but sold 10 000. This was an issue with digital art that was previously only solved by the reputation of X art gallery - the art gallery would say - "we certified only 10 copies, and our reputation as a gallery protects this artwork from being certified again".

> With NFTs you just do it.

No, you can't. Anybody can go right now and mint their own series of BAYC or any artwork they want. The blockchain will allow it. It won't even care if you mint it against the exact same data, because as far as I know nothing in the blockchain cares that there's more than one NFT pointing to the same URL, or pointing to an URL that resolves to content bit-by-bit identical to something somebody else already minted.

The only guarantee you can have is an extremely weak one, in the form of "this precise collection, with this precise unique ID is set in stone". That's not going to stop anybody from creating another one 5 minutes later.

You are correct. NFTs do not prevent counterfeiting. One could argue that it makes counterfeiting easier due to their open nature.

However, it also makes detecting counterfeits trivial. So trivial that the consumer can detect it using their own devices and freely available wallet software. No need for special skills or trust anchors like appraisers (other than the public blockchain and public standards).

This isn’t a complete solution for scams because most people don’t realize how trivial it is to check before they buy. I believe the remaining problems are in usability and education problem. The tech does lower the barrier to achieving a safer ecosystem.

We could have a healthy debate over whether the tech solved the hard side or the easy side of the problem.

> However, it also makes detecting counterfeits trivial. So trivial that the consumer can detect it using their own devices and freely available wallet software.

Only so long that the authentic source is present. You can detect the authentic BAYC because BAYC has a large presence and everyone knows their wallet ID.

Now let's say I take a photo, and you find a NFT for it on OpenSea. How do you know if it's authentic?

If you (the artist) have no presence in NFTs, it’s fake.

If you do, then I can trivially verify that you are the minter.

Crucially, the person that has the incentive to mint (the artist) also has all they need to establish the provenance of the photo.

No 3rd parties, no specialized tools/skills.

Okay, and how do you know whether I have a presence in NFTs? Go and check, and do tell me how you figure it out.

I think you are coming at this the wrong direction.

As a buyer I have to have some compulsion to buy. If that is not “I want to buy an authentic piece tied to an artist” NFTs probably aren’t for you.

With NFTs I can start at either the artist or the piece and trivially connect to the other.

NFTs don’t solve for discovery.

Nor do they provide a root of trust for artist identity. At best they can provide information to some sort of identity system but NFTs by themselves are not a complete solution for that.

As an artist who wants to sell an NFT, the onus is on you to broadcast your presence/address so that your buyers can check provenance. Post it on your Instagram maybe. It doesn’t have to be magical.

This is incorrect, as the parent explained the point of an NFT is the signature, this proves you bought from a certain collection that was created by a certain wallet

You can create your own BAYC, scammers do it all the time but they aren’t too successful because it’s trivial to see it came from an unknown wallet.

Sure, you could infringe on the copyright of a non-crypto artist and pretend to be the artist in an NFT marketplace, but then it becomes a normal copyright claim

NFTs don’t replace the legal system, they simply remove the need for the artist to be trusted by a third party (an art gallery, etc) before they can authenticate their own work to a buyer.

> This is incorrect, as the parent explained the point of an NFT is the signature, this proves you bought from a certain collection that was created by a certain wallet

Note that the parent seems to be arguing something in the system removes the need to trust in the artist, that it stops the artist from creating more items than they promised. But how? Nothing stops the artist from creating a second wallet, or a second collection.

> NFTs don’t replace the legal system, they simply remove the need for the artist to be trusted by a third party (an art gallery, etc) before they can authenticate their own work to a buyer.

I don't see how. How do I know that a given wallet ID is connected to the right person? OpenSea or whoever just takes the place of the gallery, and is effectively in charge of answering takedown requests.

It doesn’t stop the artist from re minting the same art, but if he does it will be associated to his wallet, his reputation will be tarnished, an they won’t be able to keep selling their art. The incentives are hugely against it, and unlike even physical art (who stops me from painting the same piece 20 times in secret) the ledger for the existence of the NFT is public.

That rises another question, imho: who cares?

I don't mean that in a dismissive way, I actually mean why is authenticity important or even desirable when using a medium that allows for infinite copies at near-zero marginal cost?

It's just not the right medium for it. It would be like expecting to be able to digitally transfer a statue.

This has been mysterious to me for a long time and it still remains mysterious to me, but I have to accept that people do care. This isn't just limited to NFTs, people buy signed copies of things despite signatures being trivial to forge, people buy authentic branded items even when indistinguishable counterfeits are available, people pay more for "original prints" of digital photographs!

In short, people care about provenance. NFTs guarantee provenance for data, even if the process of "attaching" it to a jpg or whatever is a bit clunky. I don't understand why people care so much about provenance, but they do, and NFTs provide a partial solution.

> Does that answer your question?

No it doesn't. Your claim was that NFTs make authenticating art easier. What you wrote has nothing to do with art authentication.

Basically I can take some digital art made by somebody else and be the first to release an NFT of it. What now? How does an NFT help us here?

It doesn’t. It just allow for a market of digital signatures for digital art. but technical solutions to the problems you’re talking about are conceivable.

Than why did you claim that:"it is better than a standard contract because the previous method of authenticating work is hugely expensive for the artist and has immense gatekeeping.", when by your own admission NFTs play no part in authenticating art??

I misspoke. All I mean is it allows for the artist to sell certified digital signatures associated with specific artworks.

Doing that previously required an art gallery to certify the signature. That’s easier in NFTs.