Process and Information regarding my NFT Sale

A note that I am just answering these questions for people who want an answer out of me. I am not writing this to tell anyone else how they should think. I'm sorry if you're sick of hearing about it, I've been getting quite a few questions regarding this and thought it would again be best explained here.

The other day I sold my first nft. I'm going to compare the carbon footprint of earning the same amount I sold it for with the calculations done in this article that has been linked to me by others: https://qz.com/1987590/the-carbon-footprint-of-creating-and-selling-an-nft-artwork/ and explain the process I went through to do it, because I have been asked about it and maybe some of you are interested.

This article compares selling a print to one nft.

I earned around $6000USD from selling this nft. -15% for the platform fees, and -200 or so to mint. This leaves me with around $4000USD.

To earn $4000 with prints, leaving out shipping since its paid by the customer, upfront costs may be $300 for printing and $200 for packaging to sell 225 individual prints at $20 each. (My convention rate, inprnt rate is higher but inprnt takes 50% so its even harder to justify.)

This would result in 2.3kg * 225 = 517.5kg.

The average sale of a NFT has been calculated to be 211kg.

Even if you take into account that oftentimes people buy multiple prints, if you half the CO2 output of the prints it is still larger than one NFT at 258.75kg.

For me to earn 4000USD, the same or less amount of emissions have occurred. There are also less physical items in the world, for better or worse. I’m not saying that this justifies NFTs. I am aware NFTs and Ethereum have faults and it is important to criticise them, but this is one of the reasons that convinced me personally to try it out. 

I've personally said in the past that I won't support Ethereum if it doesn't go green which people like bring screenshots up of, what I mean by that is if it strays from its current intentions towards releasing POS with ETH2.0. 

Process of minting and listing on Foundation

To start off, getting into Foundation requires an invitation or you can go through their new voting system. There are various marketplaces with different levels of curation. Invitations are given out to people who have received a bid. I got 5 invitations from mine. You then need to make a wallet with metamask and acquire some Ethereum (I already held some bought from an exchange) and transfer it to the wallet (transferring this ETH cost like.. $5-20? I forgot.) to cover the minting and listing fees.  These fees vary depending on network traffic and are not determined nor collected by the marketplace.

For me, minting was around $120USD for minting and $100 for listing. After that I waited about 20-30 minutes and the NFT was processed and ready for bidding. You can set whatever reserve price you’d like. You can also change the reserve price after listing, but not the title/description. After about half an hour I received a bid. 24 hours after the reserve bid was placed, the auction finished and the buyer can claim the NFT. If a bid is placed in the last 15 minutes, the timer is reset to 15 to prevent last minute sniping. If they don’t claim it, you can claim the earnings yourself but you will need to pay the transaction fees yourself. Foundation takes a 15% cut.

A few common queries:

• What does the buyer get?

Depends on the platform’s terms and conditions. In the case of foundation, the buyer does not receive rights to the artwork, only the token proving they own the NFT that has been minted by me.

• NFTs only benefit 'big' artists

Firstly I think that making 'big' artist a label to generalize who you evaluate to be too successful is also a really dumb trendy concept right now to excuse people dehumanizing anyone with higher following count. But to address the point itself, there are many 'small' artists (sub 5000 followers) thriving in the NFT marketplace. Follower count will help you make sales anywhere, otherwise its determined primarily by networking and marketing.

However after selling my own NFT, I do see how it may be an issue that currently it only really trades off the emissions from conventions/merchandise if you can guarantee the sale to go through at a certain amount. This may make it easier for people who can achieve this, likely those who have already found an amount of success, to rationalize it for themselves.

There is also the transaction fees which can be a barrier of entry. This is a known issue due and has grown due to high network traffic. There are solutions planned to address this such as L2 scaling. Even if there is an upfront cost, I do think that having a new avenue of income for artists would be great for the entire community. Generally with all business ventures an amount of capital and risk tolerance would be expected.

• You can just print screen a NFT

Does that mean you should just print an artist’s work from online and justify it with the fact you’re saving on emissions? You can also google for JPEGs of your gacha rolls, it doesn't stop people from rolling.

• NFTs are useless/serve no purpose

Most merchandise (can also be argued to be ‘useless’ material goods) and packaging instead contribute to consumerism and take up space. I am aware this is a bit ironic considering my conventions rely on the sales of merchandise, but it is still a point nonetheless. Concept of NFTs allows an alternative method to support and own something an artist made.

• NFTs promote art theft

I get my art stolen all the time on existing marketplaces, I don't really see how this is a NFT exclusive issue. At least it allows me to verify myself so that potential buyers know which NFTs are authentically minted by me.

• Finally, some benefits I see for NFTs in the context of digital art

- Resale % royalties. Many NFT marketplaces support % royalties from resales.
- Provides value to digital art (equivalent to how a signature works irl)
- Supports artist's original work. This would also allow artists to demand higher, fairer wages from companies because they have this income.
- Buyers may want to invest in artists they see potential in promoting helping newcomers
- Proof of authenticity, I think this would help artists handle design/adoptable sales (small market, but one example)

Obviously there are issues to be aware of to look into such as the environmental impact, money laundering and art theft. There are many articles floating around which I linked at the bottom of my previous post that explain these better than me so I've chosen not to address it here. I ultimately believe that the technology is new which does not excuse any of this but does mean it has room to grow. It is important for the technology to address rightful concerns. I personally don't think cryptocurrency is a scam/pyramid scheme and see potential for it to bring net benefits to society in giving people more options with decentralized finance and networks. I could be wrong though and don't claim to be an expert in this field nor able to predict the future!