Two recent events are beginning to raise suspicions among some members of the crypto community, who are questioning the immutability and trust that NFTs promise; but it seems to be a simple case of misunderstanding how these tokens work, which is instilling fear in other members.
The non-fungible tokens (NFT)These blockchain-based tokens, which represent anything and can be worth several million dollars, owe their price to their unique characteristics: authentic, original, unrepeatable, indivisible, non-fungible, and above all, immutable.
Because of these qualities, non-fungible tokens have recently gained great popularity, and have led many collectors to do “crazy things”, such as the one carried out by the group of fans of the artist Banksy and technology, who burned an original Banksy artwork to tokenize it on the blockchain. The group, called Burns Banksy, turned the work into a non-fungible token (NFT) and then burned it completely. The argument that the group used to do this feat, of burning the real work and preserving the digital one, is that the digital one cannot be modified or altered once it is recorded on the blockchain. On the other hand, the physical work, if anyone could have altered or modified it at will.
Now, two events that seem to contradict the properties of NFTs are causing great debate among some members of the crypto community, who now believe that immutability and trust are not entirely true, and that NFTs can be altered. Let's see.
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What's happening with NFTs?
The NFTs that the crypto artist recently launched under the pseudonym Neither Confirm, are no longer the computerized portraits of faces that the artist initially showed, but are now jpg images of carpets. Yes, carpets!
On his Twitter account, Neither Confirm pointed out that it was very easy for him to change the jpg associated with the NFT and replace it with what he thought best: rugs. Since Neither Confirm is the artist, and the NFTs have not yet been sold, they are still his property, and therefore he has all the power to do so.
In another case, several users who have purchased NFTs on the Valuables by Cent platform, created by the Cent company to trade digital certificates of Twitter messages, such as the one that Jack Dorsey is currently auctioning and which has already raised a figure of 2,5 million dollars, have complained that the tweets have disappeared and are no longer available.
Software developer Jameson Lopp recently discussed the possibility of someone buying a certificate for a tweet on Valuables and then having the tweet's owner delete it. However, within days of this, the possibility was demonstrated when user @SLVTRMNDI confirmed that a tweet sold on the Valuables platform in December had disappeared from Twitter.
Myths and truths
In the case of Neither Confirm, as already mentioned, the artist still has ownership over the NFTs, because none of the tokens in the collection he modified have been sold so far. Therefore, he also has the right to change it if he prefers. To understand this, it is necessary to know how NFTs work, which are based on smart contracts, or smart contracts, to which the owner can associate whatever he wants to represent within the token.
The programmer of a smart contract has the right to make any modifications he or she deems appropriate, just like the creator of an NFT, only as long as he or she maintains ownership of the token. Thus, once he or she sells it and the NFT passes into the hands of another owner, its creator loses the right to modify or alter it, because the NFT would be available at another address to which the creator would no longer have access.
In the case of Twitter messages, what is sold or traded on the Valuables platform are digital certificates, signed by the original owners or writers of the messages or tweets. These certificates prove the existence and authenticity of the messages; they also include metadata that specifies data such as: the writer of the tweet, the exact time and date it was published, its exact text content, among other things.
So, if the original owner of the tweet regrets his message or wants to delete it, it is the message that is deleted on the Twitter platform, and not the NFT. In fact, in the token, the deleted tweet message will still exist. Many users believe that this is similar to what the Burns Banksy group did with the Morons artwork that was burned, and that therefore, the tweet NFT should have more value, since it exists only on the blockchain.
User @BitcKat wrote: “Cent should take a screenshot of the tweet and continue to display it with a “deleted” label… many tweets should be much more valuable if the author who sold the tweet regrets it and deletes it.”
Risks of centralization
On the other hand, it should be noted that if an NFT is created linked to a centralized and modifiable URL, without any type of registration or certificate to back it up, its content can disappear. Neither Confirm explains that as long as the value of a work of art is deposited or controlled by a central entity that must be trusted, the owner of the NFT really “owns nothing.”
Likewise, user @checkmynft explained that centralized storage of NFT assets and metadata represents an extreme risk to the underlying value and longevity of the NFT token. Storing an NFT's metadata and assets on centralized platforms like Twitter makes the tokens highly vulnerable to asset loss if Twitter were to shut down. Therefore, the recommendation made by experts is to acquire NFTs backed by blockchain and decentralized networks, which ensure their permanence over time.
“Too much energy consumption”
Another myth that is spreading throughout the crypto community is that NFTs, especially those based on the Ethereum blockchain, consume “too much energy”; so much so that they could maintain the consumption of a house for more than a month and a half.
These assessments made it so that ArtStation, an online digital art platform, backed down just hours after launching an NFT collection on Ethereum. Part of the crypto community and several artists began to attack the platform to stop the launch, and force it to look for options on other blockchains that demand less energy. The platform published a release reporting that it was acknowledging the community’s criticism, and would look into other options to make its NFT launch “equitable and ecologically sound.”
Ethereum, the second most important blockchain in the markets, currently works on the proof-of-work consensus model, or Proof of WorkPoW), so it uses miners that do consume energy, but not as much as is believed. In fact, this is the same myth that surrounds Bitcoin, the largest decentralized network in the world, accused of causing great “damage” to the planet due to the amount of energy it requires for its operation and operability.
Less than 0,5% per year
In a article Recently published on Bit2Me News, the report issued by the International Energy Agency (IEA) was discussed, revealing that Bitcoin consumes only 0,3% of all the energy used on the planet per year. In more precise terms, the blockchain network occupies about 80 TWh per yearWhile Ethereum consumes about 25 TWh per year.
As the report explains, these figures may seem large compared to countries like Ireland, which consumes about 26 TWh; or emerging technologies like electric vehicles, which consume about 58 TWh per year, according to 2018 figures. But compared to the consumption of refrigeration, for example, Bitcoin's energy consumption is quite small. Cooling systems in the world consumed around 2.020 TWh annually by 2018And if we compare Bitcoin to the consumption of YouTube, a popular video platform, it also falls short. By the end of 2019, YouTube consumed about 2% of global energy, about 243,6 TWh per yearNow imagine how much energy giant platforms like Google, Apple or Facebook consume to keep their networks running. These platforms are looking for alternatives that allow them to reduce their carbon footprint on the planet, but cryptocurrencies are doing the same.
In cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin miners are designing new mining equipment that requires less energy to operate, and are concerned with creating new sources of clean energy to ensure network operation with the least possible environmental impact. In the United States and Russia, mining farms are already being developed with clean energy sources that take advantage of CO2 emissions from large oil plants and transform them into usable electricity.
In the case of Ethereum, the network is preparing to migrate to a new consensus protocol called proof of stake or proof of stake (PoS) which eliminates the need for miners, and therefore consumes less electricity.
Finally, Roham Gharegozlou, co-founder of Dapper Labs, noted that ArtStation's vision of stopping the launch of NFTs was "short-sighted," while user Aneurin Alexanda he pointed that the users' reaction was archaic, and that they should evaluate their preaching.
While all this is going on, crypto artist Beeple sold his crypto art collection “Everydays – The First 5000 Days” for nearly $70 million, and CryptoPunk 7804 sold for $7,5 million recently.
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