In what looks like a parody, but isn’t, the Economist, gold advocate and avid crypto-skeptic Peter Schiff has revealed a collaborative art collection of bitcoin non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that will soon go up for auction.
Reactions from the crypto community have been mixed, with people generally confused, amused, welcomed – esp Proponents of rank orders — or he’d like to point out the obvious hypocrisy.
it’s a hack right?
did i teleport to another timeline?
I am so confused
— Deezy (@CryptoDmack) May 26, 2023
For years, Schiff has been actively bashing crypto — especially Bitcoin (BTC) — at every opportunity he gets, with his arguments it basically revolves around BTC as a Ponzi scheme that has no intrinsic value.
Despite all of this, Schiff revealed the “Golden Triumph” collection in a May 27 Twitter thread in collaboration with one of his “favorite artists,” who performs under the pseudonym Business price.
“This collaboration features an original ‘Golden Triumph’ painting as well as a series of prints and Ordinals inscribed on the Bitcoin blockchain,” he wrote.
— Eric Wall ♂️ Taproot Wizard #2 (@ercwl) May 26, 2023
Golden triumph Consists of one physical oil painting depicting a human hand holding a brick of gold, 50 prints on archival paper depicting the same image, and 50 digital versions written as Ordinal NFTs on Bitcoin.
The collection will be sold through a two-part auction beginning June 2nd and ending June 9th. For Ordinals, the highest bidder will receive #1 of the collection, with the next 49 highest bidders receiving #2 through #50 in descending order. order.
However, it appears that Schiff did not do a complete U-turn on BTC and instead woke up to the use of blockchain technology; verifiable ownership of assets such as art through NFTs.
Commenting on Schiff’s post on Twitter, @LoneStartBitcoin he asked: “So… it is valuable to put your ‘golden’ inscriptions on bitcoins, but bitcoins [BTC] isn’t it valuable in itself?”
“Right,” Schiff replied.
Related: Peter Schiff blames “too much government regulation” for worsening the financial crisis.
In addition to his disdain for cryptocurrencies, Schiff has also been critical NFT on several occasions in the past.
For example, in a March 2021 blog post by Schiff described NFTs as “fake assets” that offer nothing more than ownership of a digital image that can be “infinitely replicated” online.
“But even as the owner of the image, you won’t be able to control access to it. The file has been copied thousands of times so anyone with internet access can view it just like you,” he wrote.
1) What pic.twitter.com/TsBqaRJnPI
— wab.eth (@wabdoteth) May 26, 2023
The sharp change in sentiment is in a similar vein to that of former US President Donald Trump, who also aggressively slammed the crypto on several occasions before engaging in NFTs.
In December, Trump teased a “major announcement” that MAGA supporters thought was politically connected before revealing the licensed Trump Digital Business Cards collection.
Magazine: NFT Creator: Top 10 Crypto Artist Trevor Jones on Being Rich, Fair, and Rich Again
