1. Artist creates work, signs it with his good old fashioned PGP key, publishes it.
2. Patron pays to "sponsor" the work. Artist makes a bundle of the work and patron's public key, and signs it with his own. Publishes it.
3. Patron decides he has to "sell" his patronage. He takes the bundle from 2, adds the buyer's public key, and signs it. Optionally, the artist signs it too to indicate he's OK with the "transfer". They publish it.
Are there ways to cheat? Yeah, if you're confident no one has downloaded the signed document that you published, you can try double-selling. But that's risky: if you're wrong, someone can publish the signed document and prove that you are a fraud.
This illustrates that most of the utility of "distributed blockchains" come from simple digital signatures. If all parties are accountable, public identities, this simplified scheme is strictly superior.
And remember, we're talking about art and public patronage here, not trade of illegal goods. The whole point is that you want people to see it and associate it with a public, accountable identity.
You don't need a blockchain for interoperability, neither does it enforce interoperability.
Considering how much most HN users rail against centralized services and things others not to turn stuff off, it seems like the value is obvious to me.
How so? Why is it any better than a public API?
> In the situation above the benefit is you, the recipient, are never again dependent on Reddit to validate that award for you.
You're assuming that Reddit would create an NFT that doesn't grant them any special power. Why would they do that? Why wouldn't they create a blockchain NFT with an admin address that they own and which can do pretty much anything?
> Considering how much most HN users rail against centralized services and things others not to turn stuff off, it seems like the value is obvious to me.
You can be centralized on a blockchain though, e.g. using an admin address as I described.
Specifically in that using my API won't require you to pay him money. There are other reasons they'll claim but once you dig through the chaff that's what it comes down to.
Just consider it something like decoupling in coding but for the whole internet.
- NFT can have data on the .json file, so the rewarded user can be recorded.
Do I think it is starting as a stupid toy and may eventually do more interesting things? Yes. If Reddit gives you an NFT for being a top poster for a year in a specific subreddit so you can show it off on Discord and Twitter, I don't see much value in that, but there are plenty of people who do, a lot.