At least the current usage of NFTs is a twist of the pyramid scheme.
A traditional pyramid scheme works like this:
- Alice convinces a bunch of people (let's call them collectively "Bobs") to give her money.
- each Bob convinces a bunch of Charlies to give him money.
- each Charlie convinces a bunch of Dans to give them money.
- ...repeat until the scheme falls apart.
All those individuals are lured into the scheme under the promise of easy money. But each must convince at least two others to join, otherwise they get no profit. So the scheme evolves exponentially, until there's no muppet willing to join; so you have a lot of people who are basically giving money to a few ones. And Alice in special - who started the scheme - gets money for absolutely nothing.
Now look at the NFTs. There's artificial scarcity behind "owning" the picture. You can download the picture like anyone else could (would you download a car? Fuck yeah, I would), but only one person will show as the "owner" of the picture in the NFT ledge.
Why do people buy this shit? For the artistic expression of mix-and-match pictures of bored apes? Not really - because they hope to resell it for a more expensive price. So instead of relying on more muppets joining the scheme, the NFT scheme relies on each muppet paying more and more for the "art". Like this:
- Alice "sells" Bob a bored ape picture for 50 bucks.
- Bob re"sells" the picture to Charlie for 60 bucks.
- Charlie re"sells" the picture to Dan for 75 bucks.
- Dan tries to "sell" the picture to Ed, but Ed is not a sucker.
Alice got 50 bucks. Bob, 10 bucks. Charlie, 15 bucks. They all come from Dan, who's now 75 bucks poorer.
Now, here's the question: is there any legitimate usage of NFTs? I don't know; but based on what I've read, every single other potential use can be addressed in an easier way by already existing technology. For example, the other comment chain is discussing ticket scalpers.
- Record who buys tickets, and only allow each person to buy a limited amount of them. So for example, I can buy three tickets, perhaps resell them, but if I try to buy more, whoever is selling them won't let me to.
- Demand whoever bought the ticket to be present when the ticket is being used. So for example, I can buy ten tickets; but if I do it, none of the tickets is valid unless I'm personally present on their usage.
Note that both things can be combined, either as co-requirements or options. And while they don't completely prevent scalping, they already limit its scale.