This. It's a modern variation on tulips.

I fail to see how this is different than any speculative asset?

To drive home the point from pjc50's sibling post, NFTs are "empty" speculative assets.

If you speculate with company stock, housing, or whatever else — there's generally at least some material value that could be liquidated. Even during a bubble when it's overvalued, it's generally not zero. And the cases where it can become zero (companies going completely bankrupt), there's warning signs and possibly even fraud.

NFTs just have no backing. Even "fiat money" (frequently said to "only have value because people back it", after gold standards went away) is different since it's backed by some country. NFTs? Nope. Just nothing.

Populated with real, physical resources, and real, physical people, who will take real, physical action to secure themselves, their resources, and their ideas.

Who is defending my unique set of bits? How are they defended? What is gained from defending them? What is lost if they're not defended?

Estimates that Etherum alone is responsible for a couple of coal power plants.

Proof-of-waste is the worst invention since leaded petrol and CFCs.

It’s so obvious on seeing it that proof of work is just not an accurate term to describe what is going on.