This article examines the technological emergence trajectory of Art Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), exploring their initial promise and then failure as transformative commodities disrupting art economies. Operating within an analytical framework of hope, hustle and hype, death and taxes, we investigate the interplay of technological, cultural, and economic trends shaping this trajectory towards failure. We identify the sociotechnical imaginaries clothing art NFTs and consider their relationship to both the acceptance and rejection of this technology. Our analysis contends that the desire to escape economic exclusion created a collective hope through which social adoption occurred. However, delving into the digital graveyards of Art NFTs, we identify external forces such as cultural shifts, social backlash, and regulatory interventions extinguishing the public’s ‘cruel optimism’, leading to the revocation of the social licence to operate for this emerging technology.
Background In recent years, the rise of “AI+arts” has increased public attention towards emerging digital collectibles and garnered significant interest among young adult collectors globally. However, there has been limited investigation into how emerging media effects may influence consumers’ purchase of digital collectibles from the perspective of relevant theories, particularly in collectivistic cultural contexts. To address this gap, the present study is guided by the extended Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), integrated with ideal self-congruence, and rigorously examines the effect of exposure to Non-Fungible Token digital art information on the intention to purchase digital collectibles among young Chinese adults (aged 18–34). Methods A total of 259 responses were obtained through an online survey. Statistical analyses, including direct, indirect, and serial mediation, were conducted using SPSS 25.0 and Jamovi 2.6.24. Results The findings indicate that both TPB and ideal self-congruence act as mediators in this relationship. Additionally, a serial mediation process involving ideal self-congruence and attitudes toward intelligence was identified. Conclusion These findings provide valuable insights into the complex factors influencing the purchase intention of digital collectibles among young Chinese adults. Furthermore, the findings offer recommendations for digital collectible platforms and relevant stakeholders.
Open access
Digital Marketing and Social Media
Art History and Market Analysis
Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification
This paper offers an overview of the African art scene, with a special focus on the Kenyan art scene. It will also examine non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as a new marketing tool and platform for artists from Africa, exploring how this technology has diversified artistic practices through experimentation beyond traditional painting and sculpture to video, performance art, installations, photography, and digital media. The paper does not delve into the technicalities of creating NFTs but presents an overview and experiences based on conversations with artists and a gallery owner based in Kenya. It also highlights key marketplaces available for minting and marketing NFTs online, noting those most popularly used by artists from Africa.
The subject of the research is the development of the market of non - interchangeable tokens for works of art, which has become a new paradigm in the global art market of the 21st century. The purpose of the work is to determine the place and role of non - interchangeable tokens for works of art in the life of modern society. It is shown that the world is experiencing a rapid development of the market for non-fungible tokens (NFT), which includes digital works of art created from digital materials and not linked to real assets, and tokenized non–digital works of art linked to real tangible products of artistic creation, conscious human activity with aesthetic value. The speculative nature of the NFT resale market has been established, which initially caused a “gold rush”, and subsequently its adjustment due to the accelerated production and supply of art objects in NFT, which led to a drop in prices. It is revealed that the development of the NFT market requires solving the problem of legal qualification of digital assets and inheritance in Russia, whereas abroad they are considered as proof of ownership of a digital asset. Despite the development of the financial sector in Russia in the digitalization of financial services, the domestic NET market has just begun to form, in particular the platform Kefirium.ru provides an opportunity to buy and sell NFT for rubles. Conclusions are drawn about the need for further development of digitalization of financial services, in particular the market of non-interchangeable tokens for works of art in Russia, the formation of competition between domestic platforms for the purchase and sale of NFTs for rubles, as well as the legal qualification of digital assets and their inheritance in Russia.
Purpose Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are reshaping art markets and gaining strong stakeholder interest. While research has examined their applications in art ecosystems, their role in advancing Web3D markets remains unclear. Design/methodology/approach A systematic literature review was conducted to investigate the impact of NFTs on the Web3D market and its impact on stakeholders, analysing 89 systematically selected articles. Findings The results of the study show that NFTs in the Web3D context can enhance privacy and trust through blockchain technology and protect intellectual property and ownership rights while influencing market dynamics, behaviour and investment strategies. Originality/value As the Web3D ecosystem grows, ongoing research and collaboration are critical to developing strategies that ensure sustainability, transparency and innovation in digital arts. This study is the first step in exploring these dynamics. Highlights
“Değiştirilemez ve benzersiz varlıklar” şeklinde ifade edilen NFT’ler (Non-Fungible Token), kripto para teknolojisinin bir uzantısı olarak doğmuş olmasına rağmen kısa süre içerisinde sanat ve estetik konularıyla iç içe geçmiştir. Dijital sanatın bir göstergesi olan NFT’ler, sadece estetik ve etik açıdan değil, aynı zamanda orijinallik, koleksiyonerlik ve ticarileşme gibi pek çok açıdan incelenmeye değer bir konudur. Yapay zekâ destekli algoritmaların etken bir faktör olarak NFT’lerde yer alması, sanatçının rolünü birçok açıdan dönüştürmüştür. Bunun yanı sıra sanat eserlerinin mülkiyetinin dijitalleşmesi, eserden beklentilerin de değişmesine sebep olmuştur. Bu değişimde NFT’ler üzerinden sanatın ticarî bir meta hâline getirilmesinin büyük bir etkisi bulunmaktadır. Yapay zekâ desteğiyle üretilen sanat eserlerinin, yine yapay zekâ tarafından manipüle edilerek para piyasalarını kontrol altına alabilmesi pek çok spekülasyona yol açsa da Refik Anadol, Murat Pak, Selçuk Erdem, Cem Yılmaz gibi bazı öncü Türk NFT sanatçıları küresel ölçekte yeni bir sanat zemini oluşturmuştur. Bu çalışmada yapay zekâ ile desteklenen NFT’lerin sanat dünyasındaki yeri, Türk NFT sanatçıları örnekleminde değerlendirilecektir. Aynı zamanda sanatın doğuşundan kitlelere uzanan yolda yapay zekânın etkisi ve önemi ile yaratıcılık ve orijinallik kavramlarının nasıl değişime uğradığı tartışılacak, NFT’lerin sanatı yayma gücü ve potansiyeli irdelenirken, dijital teknolojilerin sanatçı ve sanatın alımlayıcısı arasındaki yeni ve doğrudan ilişkiyi nasıl dönüştürdüğü üzerinde de durulacaktır.
We investigate the impact of anonymity and privacy-preservation on cryptocurrency use. We find that privacy coins, which deploy advanced privacy-preserving technologies to enhance trader anonymity, experience a relative increase in usage compared to non-privacy coins following regulatory interventions aimed at countering illegal activities in cryptocurrency trading and use. However, the adoption of privacy coins decreases relative to non-privacy coins after the introduction of regulations restricting the use of privacy-preserving protocols. These findings underscore the significance of privacy as a driving factor in cryptocurrency adoption.
Until recently, digital art was perceived as something of secondary value compared to the physical artistic artifacts. One of the reasons for that being its predisposition for duplication and hence the inability to assign “original artwork” label to the digital file and represent it as a unique object on artistic market. But the rapid pace of popularization of blockchain technologies in creative communities through the use of Non-Fungible Tokens has a seeming potential to change the perception of digital art. The ERC721 standard sets a precedent for authentication and traceability of digital artworks suggesting that the old paradigm might shift, and digital art will gain value and attention comparable with traditional fine art. In this article we discuss the problematics of digital art representation on art market and the issue of digital creations’ pricing. We use photo stocks and print-on-demand platforms as an example for pre-NFTs digital art monetization. We then discuss the changes caused by Non-Fungible Token blockchain technology in the digital art market in recent years and the implications that come with the change. We then illustrate theoretical tenets with expert interview that suggest that while successful NFT projects offers publicity and profit to the creators, the level of complexity and unpredictability of results sets a high bar for entering the market.
A Frino, Robert Gaudiosi, Robert I. Webb, Z. Ivy Zhou
ABSTRACT This study clarifies discrepancies in previous research on the contribution of regulated Bitcoin futures to price discovery, where conclusions have varied between futures leading over spot markets or vice versa. We identify potential reasons behind these conflicting findings, including the choice of price discovery measures, sampling frequencies, modeling windows, futures contracts, and spot exchanges. Using 1‐s sampling frequencies to accurately capture price discovery in the fast‐paced markets and accounting for substantial noise differences between spot and futures markets, we find that the futures market generally leads spot markets, though this price leadership exhibits daily fluctuations. Moreover, we observe a pronounced increase in the futures market's contribution to price discovery around macroeconomic surprises and Tether stablecoin minting tweets.
Cryptocurrencies are a type of financial instrument that has been widely used by financial market participants since the early 2010s. Despite their growing popularity, their status within financial systems across different countries remains a topic of ongoing discussion. There is still no consensus on how to best understand the economic nature of these digital assets. This paper uses discourse analysis and content analysis to explore the various interpretations of cryptocurrencies’ economic nature. The paper argues that the interpretation of cryptocurrency’s economic nature depends heavily on the perspective of the stakeholder and the intended purpose of using the term. It considers arguments both for and against treating cryptocurrencies as commodities, currencies (including electronic and private currencies), or properties (assets, such as financial assets). It concludes that traditional cryptocurrencies do not meet the criteria for being considered money, and only central bank-issued digital currencies can fulfill all the functions associated with money. Decentralized cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, cannot be classified as securities because there are no companies or organizations that issue these assets and bear any obligations under them. Instead, these assets have the characteristics of commodities. Different types of cryptocurrencies can be treated as either commodities or securities for tax purposes, depending on the specific circumstances. At the same time, assets with unique characteristics and behavior in the financial market may be included in a separate category for accounting purposes, or if the state allows for the use of cryptocurrencies in transactions without restrictions, they can be considered equivalent to cash.
Digital art has been increasingly popular with the development of blockchain technology. Blockchain technology provides a form of protection for digital art sellers and buyers as it enables verifiable and tamper-proof records of ownership of digital artworks. In addition, it also records the information and transaction history of the artworks and allows public access to the information with exceptional transparency. Hence, it not only offers digital artists a new format to sell and promote their works but also allows researchers to observe the market activities. Thus, in this thesis, I focus on the subset of digital arts with information and transaction histories recorded on the blockchain. A digital artwork/collectible (e.g., image, video, music) recorded on the blockchain is also called a non-fungible token (NFT). NFTs are becoming an increasingly popular form of art investment, with rocketed market growth in 2021. However, both consumers and sellers face uncertainty in the market activities. Consumers encounter uncertainty when making purchase decisions as there are no established valuation guidelines for NFTs. Sellers confront uncertainty when creating artwork owing to the lack of knowledge about consumer demand. Thus, this thesis investigates two different topics that surround uncertainty in the NFT market. Chapter 1 examines herding behavior in NFT auctions and the moderating role of visual complexity and familiarity. Auction is one of the most popular selling formats in the NFT market. Given the valuation uncertainty for NFTs, consumers’ bidding tendencies would be influenced by other collectors’ bidding decisions (herding behavior). I build a model on bid continuation probability to capture the herding behavior in the primary auctions. In addition, the visual cues are essential in evaluating the artwork. In this regard, I examine how visual complexity and familiarity affect herding behavior, as these two visual characteristics usually affect both the ease of understanding and recognizing the visual stimulus. I use a computer vision technique to quantify the visual complexity of an NFT, and apply transfer learning to measure its visual familiarity. The findings show that there is herding behavior in NFT auctions, and visual complexity and familiarity both exhibit a U-shape moderating effect on herding tendency. This research further tests the subsequent impact of herding behavior in the primary auctions on the auction winners’ resale decisions. Results suggest that auction winners are more willing to resale the NFT and set a higher price premium when there is stronger herding behavior in the primary auctions. This research contributes to herding, NFT, and creative content production literature, and provides managerial implications for content creators and market platforms to promote sales. Chapter 2 investigates how sellers can enhance revenue and benefit from introducing consumer uncertainty in product assignment (i.e., probabilistic selling). Probabilistic selling has become an increasingly popular and relevant phenomenon across industries, from traditional online travel agencies (e.g., probabilistic hotel rooms), retailing (e.g., clothing, and cosmetics subscription boxes) to digital gaming (e.g., in-game products), non-fungible tokens (NFTs), etc. However, despite the market prevalence, there is no empirical investigation into the actual benefit of marketers employing probabilistic selling to the best of our knowledge. Leveraging a feature change in an NFT marketplace, this research quantifies the effect of adopting probabilistic selling on sellers’ monthly revenue using three estimators (i.e., two-way fixed effect DiD, staggered DiD, and aggregate synthetic DiD). Results consistently show that probabilistic selling increases adopters’ monthly revenue within the range of $500.455 to $665.869. In addition, this research finds three underlying mechanisms that drive the revenue lift: protection provision on the transparent market, increased market thickness and matches, and enhanced market matching efficiency. At the same time, alternative mechanisms are discussed and ruled out. These findings add to the probabilistic selling, uncertain marketing and NFT literature. This research also provides managerial implications for sellers to increase sales and for market platforms to promote market participation and enhance market matching efficiency.
Ignacy Nieweglowski, Aviv Yaish, Fahad Saleh, Fan Zhang
Cryptoassets launched by political figures, e.g., political finance (PoliFi) tokens, have recently attracted attention. Chief among them are the eponymous tokens backed by the 47th president and first lady of the United States, TRUMPandMELANIA. We empirically analyze both, and study their impact on the broad decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. Via a comparative longitudinal study, we uncover a "Trump Effect": the behavior of these tokens correlates positively with presidential approval ratings, whereas the same tight coupling does not extend to other cryptoassets and administrations. We additionally quantify the ecosystemic impact, finding that the fervor surrounding the two assets was accompanied by capital flows towards associated platforms like the Solana blockchain, which also enjoyed record volumes and fee expenditure.
NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) and blockchain are revolutionizing the art market by offering advantages in terms of traceability and authenticity of works. Through blockchain, every transaction is recorded transparently and immutably, ensuring provenance and control over the circulation of the artwork. NFTs certify the uniqueness of a digital work, acting as a guarantee of authenticity and tracking each ownership transfer. Additionally, NFTs enable the tokenization of art, breaking ownership into shares, making it accessible to a broader audience and creating new investment and engagement opportunities.
In this study, we propose a valuation methodology for Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), focusing on the profile picture (PFP) NFT category represented by the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC). To identify the attributes that influence the value of individual BAYC NFTs, we develop a hedonic pricing model that uses the NFT’s value as the dependent variable and its properties as independent variables. We apply Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency (TF-IDF) to quantify attributes of NFTs. Three hedonic models—linear, quadratic, and full quadratic—are proposed. For the full quadratic model, we introduce a systematic procedure to select first-order, second-order, and interaction terms in the model. To evaluate the performance of the proposed models, we carried out comparative computational experiments. We collected actual BAYC transaction data and split it into a training set (70%) and a validation set (30%). For benchmarking purposes, we compare the proposed models against four machine learning algorithms: Random Forest, Support Vector Regression (SVR), XGBoost, and LightGBM. The machine learning models perform well on the training set, however, this was largely due to overfitting. In contrast, the proposed hedonic models maintained consistent performance with minimal degradation from the training to the validation set. Among them, the full quadratic model demonstrates the highest explanatory power on the validation set in terms of adjusted R² and other evaluation metrics.
Cette recherche interroge les mutations du champ artistique à l’ère numérique à travers l’émergence des NFTs comme dispositifs de circulation, de légitimation et de monétisation. S’appuyant sur une analyse de contenu (X, Reddit) et une enquête par questionnaire (artistes et institutions), il examine dans quelle mesure ces technologies participent à une désintermédiation réelle ou tendent à reconduire, sous d’autres formes, les logiques de pouvoir, de hiérarchisation et de sélection caractéristiques au champ de l’art traditionnel. L’étude explore les tensions entre les promesses d’autonomie portées par le Web3 et les configurations concrètes observées dans un écosystème structuré par des plateformes, des algorithmes et des logiques économiques variables.
The concept of NFTs is tightly associated with the arrival of Web 3.0 in the digital world. Despite the increased aspirations for this new technological phenomenon with promises of protection, new paths of economic exploitation, and innovation, the reality seems more complex. Under the blockchain ecosystem, it is evident that NFTs present a unique structure that is far from what the EU legislator could imagine during the drafting of the EU copyright law regime. This raises the central issue of how NFTs should be legally treated under EU copyright law. Specifically, which actions related to NFTs fall within the scope of the economic rights granted to authors? What distinguishes a lawful minting process from an act of copyright infringement? These questions are tightly associated with the context of digital artworks. However, the main obstacle remains the absence of a clear law regime and case-law regarding Art NFTs. Consequently, this fluidity creates ambiguities between the owners and the buyers for the ownership regime. The purpose of this article is to clear the blurry legal atmosphere related to the application of the EU copyright law to Art NFTs. More specifically, “How Art NFTs interact with copyright? Is there a level of protection that is ensured? In the event of a copyright infringement, who should be held liable? To answer these questions, the research will begin by examining the technological “personality” of NFTs, focusing on the key elements that ensure their functionality as unique tokens. After that, a legal analysis will follow concerning the interaction with the EU copyright regime whether they are eligible for copyright protection, and what economic rights are entailed during the creation of an NFT. Finally, the possible ownership scenarios will be presented and the cases of infringement in the governance of these digital assets.
Abstract The market for the sale of art-NFTs is a reality, but due to their diffuse legal nature, there are many doubts about this business model from a legal perspective. This raises uncertainties as to whether it is possible to recognise a property right over the NFT as a digital asset and an online distribution rights model, where the principle of exhaustion is recognised from the intellectual property law perspective.
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have been developed over the past few years as an impactful new digital asset class that allows both artists and cultural institutions to securely generate revenue from their digital creations while protecting them. However, limited research exists that fully addresses the integration of NFTs and smart contracts as a technological framework for preserving and promoting artistic and cultural heritage in Malaysia. While there has been much discussion about the economic advantages of NFTs paired with smart contracts, the technical backbone infrastructure remains largely unexplored in many ways for cultural preservation. The research explores NFTs and smart contracts to offer automated royalties and an unprecedented transfer of ownership system with cultural impact. This research, through a mixed-method approach-including a literature review, interviews with experts, and the formulation of relevant mathematical models-conducted an analysis of how smart contracts automate the NFT transaction and royalty distribution. The results have so far shown that, underpinned by blockchain technology, NFTs can offer a promising solution to present and future Malaysian artists and cultural institutions in ensuring the authenticity and financial viability of traditional and modern forms of art. Besides that, scalability, environmental concerns, and legal frameworks are several sober challenges to widespread adoption. Finally, this research concludes that NFTs and smart contracts have the potential to revolutionize Malaysia's cultural economy by offering a sustainable model for heritage preservation and a supporter of the arts in general.