A few months back, I decided to take a closer look at this NFT business. I love art, and these digital enigmas are said to be 'revolutionising the art world'. But what do you do with a digital work of art, and why on earth would anyone pay millions of dollars for one? And why is all the 'art' I see associated with NFTs just so damn awful?
I assumed I was missing something, so I did some research. Lord have mercy on our souls, dear reader. I did not discover that NFT art has an esoteric yet authentic value not immediately obvious to Luddites like myself. Quite the opposite. They're even worse than I suspected. Partly, it's the name: non-fungible token. (Fungible... sounds like a word you'd use to describe a bacterial infection.) Partly, it's what they represent: crude, cartoonish depictions passing themselves off as Important Art.
NFTs rose into mainstream consciousness as a seemingly sensible answer to authenticating digital art, but they've since become a modern symbol of the emperor's new clothes. How else can we account for the eye-watering amounts of money celebrities are handing over for a digital image of a cartoon monkey? Yes, that's right.
It's called a Bored Ape, which is exactly what it sounds like, and Gwyneth Paltrow, Justin Bieber, Paris Hilton, Madonna, Timbaland, Jimmy Fallon and Snoop Dogg have all paid anywhere from $200 000 to more than $2 million for a customised illustration of this disinterested primate. Full disclosure: The Bored Ape NFT collection isn't only an image - it's also an access card to a notso-secret society. Bored Ape NFT owners belong to an exclusive online club and get invited to Bored Ape events. (One cannot overlook the irony that these are clearly very bored celebrities, using their wealth about as judiciously as a simian.)
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