D&D General NFTs Are Here To Ruin Dungeons & Dragons

[Fanaelialae]

You know what?

None of that matters.

Let's pretend they actually care and tomorrow they all switch to renewable energy and that causes a solar boom. It will never happen and these farms are too decentralized for us to even reasonably pretend this, but let's just say it happens for the moment.

It doesn't matter.

Because it's still a technology in search of a purpose hopelessly mired in a culture of greed and grift that thrives on scams, taking advantage of people in poor and developing countries, steeling IP, worshipping conspicuous consumption, wallowing in ignorance of law, common sense and how technology works, constantly trying to expand itself where it doesn't belong and manipulate any subculture they think they can weasel their buzzwords into.

Saying they 'might' do something they will never and would never either want or be able to do doesn't fix the rot that goes straight to the core of crypto.

I think I see a nugget of truth there, but it's dripping with so much hyperbole and vitriol that it's hard to make out.

It's tech. It's just a thing. Not good; not evil; a thing. At worst it's an imperfectly designed thing that leaves a lot to be desired in terms of efficiency, et al. (I'd agree with that assessment.) Which really means that there's room for improvement (this should generally be expected of most emerging tech).

There maybe be subcultures that have formed around it that are rotten to the core (of that I have no doubt). But painting large groups of people with the same broad brush is never a thing one should aspire to, IMO. I don't believe that everyone involved in any way with crypto is some kind of aspiring scam artist.

I mean, wow. I generally think of myself as a cynic, but you just rekindled my hope that I could actually be an optimist. So thanks, I guess.

 

[Jer]

Especially, as @Vaalingrade says, because the whole thing is based around greed. And not even greed for something that's physically real or useful in any way.

This. So much this.

This is what's wrong with all of the crypto. It's cargo cult investment. We put up with the endless greed around the stock and currency markets because the traders are facilitating a system that allows the production and movement of goods and services. It's not terribly efficient, but it's better than many other alternatives and in exchange for having a system that greases the wheels some investors get very rich.

Crypto is an attempt to have a market with nothing marketable. There are no goods and no services being facilitated by the crypto market - it's all just moving bits around. It's mistaking the map for the territory and it's an ultimately pointless endeavor that doesn't add anything productive back into the world and yet costs an exorbinant amount of energy to do something ultimately worthless.

NFTs are a similar thing except they're a cargo cult reproduction of either the art market or the general collectible market (digital pogs). At least the art market serves to preserve works of art that might othewise be forgotten, lost or destroyed and facilitates eventually (if slowly) getting the works into the hand of people who will appreciate them even as it makes some folks very rich in their "investments". The collectibles market at it's best does the same thing, if at a smaller scale. NFTs don't do that - they create something that nobody wants and then trade it based on the idea that it will appreciate in value based on how other crypto items have appreciated in value.

It's all the negatives of capitalism without any of the benefits. And it's using more energy than many small countries do to do it. It's the most infuriating thing to see people think it's some kind of good thing when it's literally the poster child for a terrible idea.

 

[bulletmeat]

This. So much this.

This is what's wrong with all of the crypto. It's cargo cult investment. We put up with the endless greed around the stock and currency markets because the traders are facilitating a system that allows the production and movement of goods and services. It's not terribly efficient, but it's better than many other alternatives and in exchange for having a system that greases the wheels some investors get very rich.

Crypto is an attempt to have a market with nothing marketable. There are no goods and no services being facilitated by the crypto market - it's all just moving bits around. It's mistaking the map for the territory and it's an ultimately pointless endeavor that doesn't add anything productive back into the world and yet costs an exorbinant amount of energy to do something ultimately worthless.

But isn't investing in the dollar or credit card companies the same thing? People invest in banking but there is no real actual anything but what they value the dollar at. The way financial services are moving to digital only and fewer places take money this could be the move to digital.

I agree on the NFT part though.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I mean, wow. I generally think of myself as a cynic, but you just rekindled my hope that I could actually be an optimist. So thanks, I guess.

As much as a majority of my career is about bringing hope and optimism to people, this is not a thing to be optimistic about.

 

[Fanaelialae]

No, @Fanaelialae, I may not fully understand what you mean. But I think that "if we're lucky" isn't really good enough for now. Especially, as @Vaalingrade says, because the whole thing is based around greed. And not even greed for something that's physically real or useful in any way. Nobody needs to buy someone else's character sheet, especially not for these prices.

​

I'm sorry to inform you, but that whole greed thing is way more pervasive than just crypto. Our society and economy are essentially founded upon the principle of greed. Greed may be toxic, but it's a fairly effective motivator.

Physically real or no, plenty of things that people waste money on are not useful in any way. Beanie Babies, anyone?

And here I was thinking I might be an optimist. Silly me.

 

[Jer]

But isn't investing in the dollar or credit card companies the same thing? People invest in banking but there is no real actual anything but what they value the dollar at. The way financial services are moving to digital only and fewer places take money this could be the move to digital.

No. This is more cargo cult thinking - that because money isn't backed by gold that means that there's no value in money so anything can be money. That's not the case - the value in money is the belief that a country that issues it will be able to pay its debts - the currency you (or a bank) owns is a debt that country owes to you (or the bank). When countries default their money tanks because it's value is based on that belief and that's why it moves from being "money" to "worthless paper". When it's all electronic the only thing that changes is you no longer have the paper - but you still have the purchasing power of that money so long as the country that issues it is solvent.

The value of a bitcoin is literally just in the belief that it's value will continue to rise - it's completely disconnected from anything other than the mass belief of the holders and buyers of bitcoin. It doesn't represent anything the way money represents a debt to be repaid - it's literally just bits. That's why I call them "digital pogs" - the entire value of a pog was in how much other people were willing to pay for it. It had no real intrinsic worth unless you were one of the dozen or so people who actually played pogs with them. And once the speculators who were buying them up sure that they were going to be the next hot collectible stopped buying them, the entire market collapsed. Because they were a thing nobody but the speculators actually had any use or interest in.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Physically real or no, plenty of things that people waste money on are not useful in any way. Beanie Babies, anyone?

There is a massive gulf between 'sells useless item' and 'uses pretext of useless item to defraud, exploit, an rob people'.

 

[Jer]

It's tech. It's just a thing. Not good; not evil; a thing.

The tech is neutral, the purpose it's put to is not.

Blockchain is neutral. Crypto and NFTs are useless at best, actively destructive at their worst.

 

[Remathilis]

I'm sorry to inform you, but that whole greed thing is way more pervasive than just crypto. Our society and economy are essentially founded upon the principle of greed. Greed may be toxic, but it's a fairly effective motivator.

Physically real or no, plenty of things that people waste money on are not useful in any way. Beanie Babies, anyone?

And here I was thinking I might be an optimist. Silly me.

The pervasive joke is "at least with tulips, I got a flower out of it." Most NFT projects are vaporware. You get a procedurally generated image on a server somewhere and a link to it on the Blockchain. Every other aspect; cartoons, games, merch, access to events and people, even island nations, have either underdelivered, are MIA, or were rug pulls. It's the worst of Kickstarter scams on top of the virtual pogs.

If there was any use for the tech, the rampant scams have tainted it.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Vaguely related, other gaming companies (video games, in this case) are treating NFTs like catnip.

Sega Says 'Future Of Gaming' Includes NFTs And Cloud Streaming

It seems, like some other big video game publishers, Sega is also interested in adding NFTs into future games as revealed in an interview with various executives and producers. During that same interview, Sega talked more about its “Super Game” projects, confirming that it will be more than one...

finance.yahoo.com

It seems, like some other big video game publishers, Sega is also interested in adding NFTs into future games as revealed in an interview with various executives and producers. During that same interview, Sega talked more about its “Super Game” projects, confirming that it will be more than one game and some of them could involve streaming and cloud gaming.