Ive been thinking a lot about NFTs and trying to wrap my head around them. They’ve been really popular among people in my industry & raises some good questions in Pokemon as well.
Why do we (as collectors, flippers, whoever’s) see more value in owning an “original” print vs a near perfect proxy?
None of us own the original, those are locked in a vault at Pokemon somewhere. Many of us are happy to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on a print that was authorized by the owner of the original, even though it’s utility is identical to that of a photocopy.
IMO, 99.9% of the value of an “authorized print” (aka real card) is in the flex value of having something inherently limited.
Can you all come up with anything more to an authorized print that gives it significantly more value than a duplicate?
EDIT: Try to add something more than “proxies are fakes”, I think there’s an interesting discussion here. I’m really trying to get more at the tangible value vs perceived/flex/virtual value thing.
nfts aren’t tangible. Proxy cards can be made by anyone with a printer…they aren’t real, aren’t rare and are pointless. Its like printing a mona lisa, framing it and trying to get millions. What is the difference? XD
authorized print and duplicate are other ways of saying fake. Flexing doesn’t have a value and never will, it purely to boost ego and we cant spend it or buy stuff with it XD
Loyalty to the creator. It took hard work and dedication to create the original. By this standard people shouldn’t feel proud of creating something original.
Well cards aren’t “original” either. Cards are more similar to the owner of the mona lisa selling numbered prints. Limited but not any more real than someone printing them with a similar printer
But is that really the very core appeal? I could draw you a (really ugly) Charizard and sign a contract with you to guarantee that I’ll never make a second one. It’d be a one-of-a-kind, but I guess you’d still prefer the original authentic card, wouldn’t you?
I think that the saying “demand creates demand” holds true here. We want the original because everyone else wants the original. That’s kind of a stupid reason, but humans are stupid most of the time.
I find the analogy slightly misleading. We don’t buy prints of the original artwork. We buy official cards for which artwork was utilized to create it.
If someone was selling prints of the original artwork, then we could make the comparison. As it is, I WISH they made original prints that could be bought.
The card itself is the intended product. The card itself is an original print done in limited runs. When you buy a card, you’re buying not just the art, but the entirety of the design. It’s not like someone made a handmade card and glued things together and then everyone just scanned a copy and made prints.
I like my cards like how I like my money - not counterfeit.
To me a proxy is a worthless piece of cardboard. Also as someone how has played the actual tcg at one point, there is a reason why you cant use proxies in a tournament and the same reasons apply to my collection.
Sure, that’s interesting. You want to own the specific print from some moment in time, it’s not about the artwork. Even if someone made an indistinguishable copy of the item you would prefer the one that you knew had a certain lineage.
Do you think you could make that sentence “I want to own the actual Charizard pulled from a base pack printed in 1999.” more generally applicable?
Rarity doesn’t just mean “hehe I have a thing only 100 other people have” - rarity also means “if I spend 10.000$ on this, they won’t just print more and my value evaporates. In fact, if I buy this, I can collect while likely at least preserving the value I put into it.” Rarity inherently means “harder do acquire”, then supply and demand just do their thing.
I like this thought. To me I take it as, the modification of the art work (adding a release, adding the border/text/attacks, printing is a new artwork altogether)
Although if you had an indistinguishable copy of the card, what from that would you lose?
Ok, so you do agree though. If you’re saying value is preserved by limited release, then you do care about the “flex”. Without the flex value (your 10k card was actually 50 cents), would you still want it?