As if the world of cryptocurrency wasn’t confusing enough, 2021 saw the explosion of NFTs. Let’s look at some of the weird and wonderful things people have sold as NFTs.
What is an NFT?
A non-fungible token, or NFT, is essentially a certificate of ownership of a digital asset.
‘Fungible’ means ‘replaceable’, so NFTs are given the status of being irreplaceable virtual items. While digital assets can be easily downloaded, saved or copied, NFTs allow someone to own the ‘original’ digital work, while copies would be worthless.
Most NFTs are part of the Ethereum blockchain. You don’t actually own the original gif, video or image file, all of which can be replicated for free. NFTs use metadata, which is processed through a special algorithm (a cryptographic hash function, if you want the technical term) to produce a unique string of numbers, which is linked to the digital asset. Basically, you own a token that proves that you own the token.
Still confused? Yeah, me too…
NFTs exploded at the start of 2021, offering digital artists a shot at the exclusivity and commercial appeal enjoyed by traditional artists. However, as with all things digital, shit got weird almost immediately.
Here are some of the weirdest NFTs that have been bought and sold.
Memes and viral videos
Some of the internet’s most popular memes and viral videos hit the NFT market, giving content creators a new way to monetise their work.
In February, ‘Nyan Cat’ sold at auction for $590,000 (£424,000). Not a bad chunk of change for a rainbow Pop-Tart cat from 2011.
The viral video ‘Charlie bit my finger’ was sold as an NFT in May for $760,000 (£546,100). The creator had announced that they would remove the video from YouTube following the auction, but it is currently still accessible, though unlisted.
‘Disaster Girl’ sold in April for $473,000 (£340,000), while the infamous ‘Leave Britney alone’ video netted creator Chris Crocker $41,000 (£29,500) to help fund their gender transition.
https://www.mic.com/p/the-weirdest-nfts-being-sold-right-now-65517517
just setting up my twttr
— jack (@jack) March 21, 2006
Twitter founder’s first tweet
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey’s first tweet, the extremely ordinary yet utterly groundbreaking “just setting up my twttr”, was sold as an NFT in March.
This simple sentence, with its cavalier disregard of grammar, spelling and punctuation, sold for a whopping $2.9 million (£2.1 million). That’s almost $600,000 per word.
Dorsey converted the proceeds to Bitcoin and donated them to GiveDirectly’s Africa Response, so at least this weird transaction helped a good cause.
https://www.mic.com/p/the-weirdest-nfts-being-sold-right-now-65517517
A digital Trump corpse
Yep. You read that right.
In November 2020, digital artist Mike Winkelmann, AKA Beeple, sold an NFT titled ‘Crossroads’ that changed based on the outcome of the 2020 election.
The artwork featured three distinct states: pre-election, Trump win, and Biden win. The description of the artwork on Nifty states: “If anything is constant about the times we now live in, it’s uncertainty. This uncertainty is perfectly encapsulated in this piece of artwork as the person buying the piece will not know the final artwork.”
It’s a pretty interesting concept, even if the final artwork of an enormous Donald Trump corpse covered in graffiti under a rainbow isn’t quite to your taste. I highly recommend checking out the Trump win edition, which Beeple describes as “sexy boi king trump stomping through hell” and is both delightfully bonkers and extremely terrifying.
https://niftygateway.com/itemdetail/primary/0x12f28e2106ce8fd8464885b80ea865e98b465149/1
Food you can’t eat, and sneakers you can’t wear
Created by teenage chef and MasterChef Junior winner Logan Guleff, ‘Dinner for One’ has been described as a non-fungible token dining experience.
A more accurate description would be a montage of several food photographs with an ‘artistic’ filter. Although it’s been for sale since March, nobody has yet placed any bids on this completely inedible three-course meal.
In a similar, but much more successful, vein, RTFKT, creators of virtual sneakers and collectibles, continued “merging realities in fashion and gaming” by releasing NFT sneakers.
In collaboration with 18-year-old Seattle-based artist FEWOCiOUS, tokens representing 608 pairs of digital sneakers were sold in March, racking up over $3 million (£2.2 million) in just seven minutes. To be fair, NFT owners were then given a 48-hour window to claim a free physical pair.
It’s interesting to note that, in this case, the physical sneakers are considered a ‘free’ item, while the token itself serves as a certificate of authenticity.
So, are NFTs worth the hype?
The environmental impact of blockchain and cryptocurrencies, which fuel and support NFTs, has been heavily scrutinised over recent months, with one report concluding that Bitcoin emissions alone could push global warming above 2°C.
NFTs can be used to verify ownership of all sorts of items, from artwork and luxury goods to legal documents and even virtual land. They offer opportunities to reduce counterfeit merchandise, generate income from digital assets, and increase cyber security, but their recent fad status has painted them with a bit of a weird brush.
Personally, I don’t think NFTs are viable long-term in their current state. They could be harnessed as an extremely useful tool if a solution can be found for the huge energy demands of mining cryptocurrency, but as for destroying the planet over a 10-second looped video of a huge, naked Trump corpse? Probably not worth it.
Claire Baldwin
Claire has over 10 years' copywriting experience across a range of print and digital media, working with a variety of styles, formats and tones of voice. She has written as part of an in-house team client side, as well as at marketing agencies based in the East Midlands. Claire's services include copywriting, copy editing, content creation and proofreading.