Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

Wake up. Grow up. Get in the fight.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: N-F’d-T

Grifters Gonna Grift Open Thread: N-F’d-T

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You knew he was an Evil Ape when you gave him your money... Per Kotaku:

… More than 4,000 NFTs in the “Evolved Apes” offering have been sold since they first went on sale a week ago, according to Vice. Their “origin” comes from several hideous JPGs, which are already a rip-off of the more successful “Bored Ape” series. NFT creator Evil Ape promises not only would buyers receive a “unique NFT trapped inside a lawless land” but also cash giveaways, and an accompanying fighting video game to go along with the useless, ugly-ass images.

Then, surprise! On Friday Evil Ape bailed, shutting down the Evolved Apes website and taking its Twitter account with them. They also vanished with the $2.7 million they’d raised by selling idiots a jpg that looks like someone ordered a Gorillaz poster on Wish…

Please note here that the artist behind the images, literally the only person who did any real work involved in the NFT, was not paid. And that despite everything that has happened, hundreds of sales have taken place since the move (over $50,000 worth), each one netting Evil Ape 4% in royalties…

But spinning money out of hope & algorithms is a recognized form of religious belief now, and social norms require we treat its believers as something more than dupes for the most amoral among them. From an illuminating thread:

First let’s talk about what the NFT market actually is. Unlike buying bonds, equities, real estate, or actual art you’re not buying something with any tangible existence, rights or utility. You’re buying an expensive entry in someone else’s database. (2/)

There is one comparable market to NFTs: The Star Naming Market.

Back in the 90s some entrepreneurs found you could convince the public to buy “rights” to name yet-unnamed stars after their loved ones by selling entries in an unofficial register…
(3/)
…
Thing with star registries is they’re not unique and don’t actually convey ownership. The entire grift is in convincing other people that it has meaning. The value of naming is a star is precisely how much bullshit your loved one is willing to buy in this enterprise (5/)
…
NFTs are the evolution of this grift in a more convoluted form. Instead of allegedly buying a star, you’re allegedly buying a JPEG from an artist. Except you’re not buying the image, you’re buying a digitally signed URL to the image. (7/)

Except now instead of buying your digital star with dollars there’s a second leg to the scam. You have to purchase the star by exchanging your dollars for some weird token whose value fluctuates on some secondary market. (8/)
…
The core of the NFT grift is outsourcing the marketing for this artificially scare registrar to artists who are forced to pay large sums of money upfront to list URLs to their artwork in the hopes of recovering their lost costs. (10/)

Much more at the link.

Reader Interactions

90Comments

  2. 2.

    Chetan Murthy

    An interesting take on the entire NFT scene:
    https://www.stormingtheivorytower.com/2021/06/the-nfts-aura-or-why-is-nft-art-so-ugly.html
    https://www.stormingtheivorytower.com/2021/07/the-nft-rube-goldberg-machine-or-why-is.html

    This isn’t at all positive about NFTs, and the writer is pretty clear about that.  But the writer approaches the NFT scene from the POV of “is it art?”  And …. well, it’s great, really great, really, really really GREAT!  They’re clearly completely unimpressed, but they’re also a decent writer, so they make the experience of shitting all over the entire scene a real joy.

    I really enjoyed the reads.

  4. 4.

    Poe Larity

    I bet you laughed about Bitcoin. You just don’t get it (like .com)!

    As there is apparently some balloon-a-versary soon, SNL dropped Radioheads 2000 appearance on the uintertubes. Well worth watching unless you’re a normie. With a brass band… because why the f**k not?

  7. 7.

    Anne Laurie

    @James E Powell: What can you say about people who fall for this stuff?

    The classic formulation went: Overeducated for their intelligence.
    Smart enough to learn the magic words; not smart enough to understand the difference between ‘magic’ and ‘practical’.

  8. 8.

    Baud

    The developer behind the NFT project, ‘Evil Ape,’ suddenly disappeared along with its Twitter account, website, and $2.7 million

    That’s how I’d like to disappear from Balloon Juice.

  12. 12.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Omnes Omnibus: you surely already know this little gem: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/there-never-was-real-tulip-fever-180964915/

    When tulips came to the Netherlands, all the world went mad. A sailor who mistook a rare tulip bulb for an onion and ate it with his herring sandwich was charged with a felony and thrown in prison. A bulb named Semper Augustus, notable for its flame-like white and red petals, sold for more than the cost of a mansion in a fashionable Amsterdam neighborhood, complete with coach and garden.

    [….]

    The only problem: none of these stories are true.

  14. 14.

    Matt McIrvin

    I don’t really get the appeal of Funko Pops either, you’d have to ask my daughter, but at least you have a physical tchotchke you can put on your mantelpiece. I could see how people who liked to look at them would want to decorate their rooms with them.

    Here, the act of ownership doesn’t really get you anything that anyone couldn’t have. Nobody’s keeping anyone from looking at the JPEGs, as far as I can tell.

  18. 18.

    Rusty

    When you buy an NFT you get nothing.  Nothing.  Anyone can still download the digital art.  The creator retains the copyright.  It’s a ridiculous bragging right at best, but really anyone could claim they own the NFT. And it burns computer power to is bad for the environment.  Ridiculous.

  19. 19.

    HumboldtBlue

    I don’t understand any of this shit, thank goodness there’s a full sports slate.

  23. 23.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Matt McIrvin:

    at least you have a physical tchotchke you can put on your mantelpiece.

    That two-parter appraising NFTs via “is it art?” makes the (I think quite cutting) observation that the NFT grifters start from the position that immense amounts of art are never physically in the possession of their owners: they reside in places like Switzerland’s Geneva Free Port (second link).  So really, it’s all just an “investment” speculation dodge.  From which these grifters conclude “if they can get away with that, why can’t I?”

    For the reality-based, it’s ridiculous on so many levels. I mean, would I want a reproduction of the Mona Lisa in my house?  Sure, why not?  If I can’t tell it from the original, why wouldn’t I want it?  The only people who’d want the original, are those who assign value to owning “the real thing”.  But if the real thing is indistinguishable from a copy, why would anybody *else* care about the difference.  Well, only if you think that the original has more resale value than a knock-off.  And hence, we’re back to “speculation”.

  26. 26.

    Chetan Murthy

    @SpaceUnit: (1) Yes, the latecomers to NFTs are definitely *stupid*

    (2) but I think the people who started it off: they’re classic grifters (only updated for the information age)

    Then again, that is (as I’m sure you agree) the case for all the cryptocurrency proponents.

  27. 27.

    raven

    We were at a “kickoff”  event for the dog parade and there was a couple there who were at the vet when they brought Artemis in. They are still shaken by how bad she was and SO happy to see her now. Did our hearts good.

  31. 31.

    SpaceUnit

    @Chetan Murthy:

    I do agree.

    Yeah, I’ll raise a glass to these grifters.  And their victims aren’t widows and orphans . . . they’re mostly morons with too much money.  It would be foolish to allow them to keep it.

  34. 34.

    Chetan Murthy

    @SpaceUnit:

    And their victims aren’t widows and orphans

    1. I have a friend who used work in finance.  That is to say, *trading*, not *investment*.
    2. He started trading crypto back in the early days, and continues to this day.
    3. He’s not an idiot: he doesn’t care if crypto goes up or down; he only cares if there’s trading volume, b/c that means he can make his bets
    4. and he’s quite convinced that as the banks pile in ……

    We will end up holding the bag, b/c the Fed will not allow the banks to fail when these bets eventually go pear-shaped.  So sadly, it’ll be widows, orphans, and retirees who pay for this.

    Fuck me.

  36. 36.

    SpaceUnit

    @Chetan Murthy:

    I admit that I had not considered this.  But are mainstream banks and financial institutions really getting involved with this nonsense?

    I think it’s just a lot of fringe hipster money-boys.  Fuck them.

  37. 37.

    Chetan Murthy

    @SpaceUnit:

    But are mainstream banks and financial institutions really getting involved with this nonsense?

    I don’t follow this shit closely [why would I, or you, or any of us?]  but I trust my friend a lot when it comes to carefully-evidenced, carefully-reasoned conclusions.  And I’ll quote from a recent email to me about this:

    there’s nothing much any gov’t will do now to depress it, even ours given the way btc has stuck its foot in the door on wall st.

    Again, he’s not a proponent: it’s just another trade to him.

  38. 38.

    Another Scott

    ICYMI, …

    Per the transcript, Rosen quoted Trump saying this and then, when asked to re-state it, reinforced that's what Trump said. pic.twitter.com/6wdAIXz9ku

    — Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) October 7, 2021

    That Donald opened the meeting talking about “overturning”—not fixing, correcting, or investigating—the election, shows a criminal intent to do something illegal/unconstitutional that had nothing to do with the voting, other than his loss. https://t.co/tcZb2JFNIy

    — Mrs. Betty Bowers (@BettyBowers) October 7, 2021

    Yup.

    Seems like a pretty big deal, no? Maybe someone at FTFNYT will release a book about it in 2023 or so…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  39. 39.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Chetan Murthy: BTW, that was part of a reply to a question about China banning crypto.  He was pretty blase’ about that: thought it was good for a 15% dip (buying oppty!  (seriously)) and not much more.

  41. 41.

    Another Scott

    @Chetan Murthy: Made me look…

    Treasury.gov:

    August 9, 2021

    WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen released the following statement on the cryptocurrency compromise reached in the U.S. Senate.

    “I am grateful to Senators Warner, Portman, Sinema, Toomey and Lummis for working together on this amendment to provide clarity on important provisions in the bipartisan infrastructure deal that will make meaningful progress on tax evasion in the cryptocurrency market. I am also thankful to Chair Wyden for his leadership and engagement on these important issues.”

    ###

    It’s something, anyway.

    And probably another reason why so many of the MotU-types are against the RB.  [eta] But this is in the BIF??!  Hmm…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  42. 42.

    James E Powell

    @SpaceUnit:

    I admit that I had not considered this.  But are mainstream banks and financial institutions really getting involved with this nonsense?

    No worries. As Alan Greenspan assured us, banksters would never get involved with reckless risks for profit.

  43. 43.

    SpaceUnit

    @Chetan Murthy:

    I’ll admit that Bitcoin has been given too much leash, and that it’s not so terribly different from NFT’s.

    And yet, NFT’s still seem like they’re just bait for all the would-be Martin Shkreli’s of the world.  Re-examine those digital images we’re talking about.  This is clearly a clown’s game.

  44. 44.

    Mary G

    I bought a bunch of rare-ish succulents on Etsy this week and almost all the vendors day they.accept bitcoin and.other crytocurrencys. Seems crazy to me

  45. 45.

    Tony Gerace

    A while ago I asked my Millennial son how on earth people can be stupid enough to fall for such an obvious scam.  His theory is that the “market” for this nonsense is kept afloat by trust fund kids who have more money than they know what to do with.  Sounds plausible.

  47. 47.

    Ken

    Look, it’s easy to mock the people who sent their ready cash and (probably) credit card and Social Security numbers to a web-based company with “Evil” in the name, in exchange for a string of bits in a Mongolian server farm somewhere that gave them sole ownership of an image that’s freely downloadable from giphy.  But when you… but if… but…

    There’s really not a “but”, is there?

  49. 49.

    Uncle Omar

    Off Topic Alert! I just saw on the Internet that AT &T is funding OAN. Of course the suits at AT&T deny it. Since this is from the Guardian no one in the mainstream will follow up.

  50. 50.

    Benw

    I still think we should sell Balloon Juice NFTs. People can bid, not for the actual commenter, but for the concept of that commenters presence on BJ. Couldn’t we get millions for the online concept of Baud, Kay, Omnes, etc? It’s worth a shot

  52. 52.

    Walker

    @Rusty: NFTs have exactly one use. Magic the Gathering cards (and their like). Anyone could print and replicate a MTG card. But to play in an official tournament, you must have possession of an unforged card. Because tournaments have prize money this drives the cost of rare cards in collectible card games. So NFTs are an attempt to bring that paper phenomenon to the digital space.

    Now you might wonder why this requires NFTs. Why not have a central server for authentication?Because players want to buy and sell these cards, and Wizards (Hasbro) would never support a website where these could be bought and sold for real money. Wizards has gone out of its way to pretend that the secondary market of Magic does not exist. That is because if they were to acknowledge (much less support) a secondary market, then there would be a strong argument that Magic is gambling and Wizards would need to be financially regulated. The lawyers at Wizards will not allow that.

    So NFTs are an attempt to replicate what exists in the paper space. A game where you need authenticated tokens to play, but one in which the manufacturer is unwilling to support a secondary market.

    This is literally the only application of NFTs that make sense to me. And ultimately, like everything else in crypto, is just an excuse to get around financial regulation.

  53. 53.

    cain

    I keep thinking that if we take the union of Trump supporters, ivermectin lovers and NFT purchasers that there will likely not be much overlap.

  55. 55.

    NotMax

    Topically, it’s a scheme just begging for abuse.

    DC is giving away free non-fungible tokens (NFTs) of its superhero comic book covers to people who register for its October 16th FanDome event. The NFT drop is set for October 5th, and those who register for FanDome will receive one free, randomly-selected NFT, and become eligible for a second free NFT if they post about their first one on social media.

    The NFTs will come in three levels of rarity; common, rare, and legendary, and will include Batman, Superman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, and Harley Quinn options. Source

  56. 56.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Chetan Murthy: Since I just bought a car I was reading about cars a bit, and one article was about how many of those astronomically expensive high-performance supercars never get driven at all, because absurdly low mileage is a part of their value. They’re too valuable to drive. They get bought by people who just hide them away in garages just to own them, or sometimes put them on static display. In many cases, they’re not people who have the skills to drive the cars without killing themselves anyway, because these cars are completely absurd vehicles to drive out on the road.

    Of course, for a car, fetishizing low mileage is kind of a problem, because a car that sits still for too long destroys itself by not moving (as I know all too well from pandemic experience). So sometimes these people are careful to run the engine for a few minutes a week. And sometimes they’re not. One zillionaire bought one new and built it into his living room.

  58. 58.

    Ken

    @James E Powell: As Alan Greenspan assured us, banksters would never get involved with reckless risks for profit.

    “What, never?”

    “No, never!”

    “What, never?”

    “With noticeably rare exceptions!”

    — “I am the Chairman of the Fed Re-serve”, HMS Fed Reserve

  61. 61.

    Hoppie

    @Walker: Many years ago I started spending money I barely had to buy original sf/fantasy art.  Not prints, originals.  Only things I wanted to look at.  It’s now a very respectable collection, but I wanted stuff I WANTED TO LOOK AT, and it serves its purpose.  Our son will do well when he sells it off, but I love LOOKING at it.  Also knowing other folks may have prints but I HAVE the original.  Venality is not a crime.

    Anyone who buys “art” for any other reason is a speculator or a fool.

  63. 63.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Matt McIrvin:

    One zillionaire bought one new and built it into his living room.

    I think it was AL who told the story of going into Williams-Sonoma to buy a $200 copper pot, with hard-saved money (or maybe gift money), and the clerk asking her “Please tell me you’re buying this to actually use“, b/c the previous customers had bought an entire set of copper pots and paid for unremovable varnish: they’d planned to hang on the wall of their too-twee-for-decency remodeled kitchen.

  65. 65.

    Peale

    @Chetan Murthy: real zillionaires can afford to hire a scullery maid to remove patinas. Real zillionaires do not dabble in automatic dishwashers.

    I bet their silverware is made from tin and spray paint.

  68. 68.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Peale: Now that I go to search for, I can’t find AL’s comment about this.  I could *swear* it was her, on this blog, with a candlestick.  Could.  Swear.

  70. 70.

    RaflW

    Is the scam even a heist?

    I know very little about NFT ‘art’, but my sense of this is that people bought some really, really expensive tickets to a gallery opening, and then the gallery shut after opening night. Crime? Probably not. Fools bought useless crap? Probably.

  71. 71.

    Feathers

    Something missing from the discussion is that so much of tech companies today is just grift. Uber has been losing millions of dollars a day, while destroying industries that provided working class jobs. Amazon has been a Wall Street darling since it began. It’s sales side has never made a profit. Amazon’s money is made via the AWS web services hosting. Meanwhile, malls are dead, bookstores are dying, so many profitable companies gone. So whatever you may say about the NFT/crypto dudes, they are trodding a well worn path.

    On Funkos. Every time I find myself wanting to buy a Funko, I remember that it’s never just one Funko. There will always be a cuter one next season. The one I really want will always be one I didn’t buy. Even if I started a collective.

  76. 76.

    Another Scott

    @Feathers: Walmart was killing retail before Amazon (and it’s still vastly bigger at retail than Amazon).  Retail has always been cut-throat.

    Remember Montgomery Ward?  JCPenney?  Sears?

    Malls have always been boom-and-bust.  Macy’s and Federated bought out a bunch of older regional department stores/mall anchors long before Amazon got huge.

    Business is change, and always has been.

    If it wasn’t Amazon, it would have been something else – the advantages of the web and not being tied to fickle retail locations are too compelling.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  81. 81.

    Kent

    @Uncle Omar:Off Topic Alert! I just saw on the Internet that AT &T is funding OAN. Of course the suits at AT&T deny it. Since this is from the Guardian no one in the mainstream will follow up.

    Talking Points Memo discussed this.  Consensus seems to be that it was business leverage against extortion by Fox News.  Fox News was extorting AT&T and other cable providers with really high subscription rates because they were the *ONLY* conservative news show and could charge what they wanted because all the cable providers needed Fox News in order to have a “balanced” lineup.  AT&T said…wanna bet?

  82. 82.

    Craig

    @Chetan Murthy: there’s a good discussion of that theme in Ken Perenyi’s book Caveat Emptor. He made a career forging famous paintings and fooling experts from Sotheby’s.

  84. 84.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Craig: I’ve read that with 3d-printers, you can get much, much closer to indistinguishable (by eye).  Looking forward to the day.  I wouldn’t mind having some reproductions of Titians.

  85. 85.

    Viva BrisVegas

    @Kent: Fox News was extorting AT&T and other cable providers with really high subscription rates because they were the *ONLY* conservative news show and could charge what they wanted because all the cable providers needed Fox News in order to have a “balanced” lineup.

    So Hard Right Fox News + Center Right everybody else = Balance?

  86. 86.

    ColoradoGuy

    Funny, I haven’t seen a Noam Chomsky channel on my cable lineup, or even FreeSpeechTV.

  87. 87.

    Ivan X

    Believe it or don’t, but there is a brick and mortar NFT shop the next block over from me in NYC.

  89. 89.

    Wsfnyc

    Here goes, I’m a long time bjer, very sporadic commenter, but I read every post. And I’m a big nft trader. Ask me anything!

     

    1. I’m not going to tell you that nfts will save the world, and there definitely are a lot of hustlers in the space, but as collectibles and hobbies go, it can be a lot of fun. So, have at it jackals.

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